An update from Deb Elias, CEO/Registrar

As part of my work as CEO/Registrar, I have made it a priority to share some of the work we do in the nursing regulatory community across Canada. There’s important work happening behind the scenes, helping to further nursing practice in Manitoba while ensuring our public protection mandate is met.

Recently, at Canadian Nurse Regulators Collaborative (CNRC) meetings, Leigh Chapman, Chief Nursing Officer of Canada, briefed us on the Nursing Retention Toolkit developed in collaboration with the Government of Canada. This new toolkit was created to support the retention of nurses across Canada now and in the future and was made by nurses, for nurses.

This continues the ongoing discussions regarding workforce planning and how to better serve Manitobans and Canadians. Nurse regulators are working together to fix these issues.

We also discussed Nursys and its ability to give information regarding multiple-jurisdictional registration. Work continues getting other nurse regulators to be a part of the program. This is the closest we have ever been to being able to use Nursys.

Next, I participated in meetings with the Canadian Council of Registered Nurses Regulators (CCRNR) and worked through doing a bylaw refresh while also determining the council’s structures and values. There were lots of discussions regarding the updates to the Nurse Practitioner framework.

In June, I will be attending the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) Summit where I and my fellow regulators get a North American perspective on nursing regulation issues.

Also, the Fair Registration Practices Office (FRPO) is moving forward with changes to language proficiency, and we should have more updates on this very soon. We continue to work towards progressive ways to ensure language proficiency in nurses across Manitoba.

I will continue to share updates on our collaborative efforts and work with our partners from coast to coast to coast.