Thank you for having me back.
I would like to thank the committee for inviting the Canadian Society for Medical Laboratory Science to appear once again today. My name is Christine Nielsen. I am the executive director for the society, which is located in Hamilton, Ontario.
The CSMLS is the national certifying body and professional association for over 14,000 medical laboratory professionals in Canada. Medical laboratory technologists, or MLTs, conduct complex laboratory tests on blood, body fluids, and body tissues, and they also interpret results. These tests provide critical information about your health.
As a group, our profession is the fourth-largest health care profession in Canada, which is incredible, considering we know that relatively few Canadians know who medical laboratory professionals are or know about the important work that we do.
Medical laboratory professionals play an extremely vital role in the Canadian health care system, generating over 440 million lab test results every year.
Doctors depend on these laboratory test results to accurately diagnose and treat illness and to monitor patient health. Canada is presently facing a nationwide shortage of medical laboratory technologists. Our current supply of new graduates will not be sufficient to address the shortages. Our organization predicts that, alarmingly, nearly half of Canada's medical laboratory technologists will be eligible to retire in the next ten years. This shortage will undoubtedly directly affect patient safety.
For over a decade, we have been alerting decision-makers that the number of seats in medical laboratory technology programs is simply not sufficient to produce enough new graduates to replace those who will leave the workforce. The domestic supply is simply too low.
Since 2000, governments have taken steps to address the shortage by opening new education programs and increasing capacity in others. This is a positive development, but the retirements coming simply will not equal the number of new graduates. In addition, funding for programs has been provided for the classroom portion only, with little thought or interest in funding clinical placement education.
As with all health professionals, clinical training is a vital component of medical laboratory science education. Completion of a clinical placement is mandated by the accreditation body, and our students cannot graduate from their programs without completing a clinical placement.
This brings me to the issue of internationally educated medical laboratory technologists, or IEMLTs. As the shortage continues to grow, Canada receives hundreds of self-identified IEMLTs through immigration every year. About 200 apply for evaluation with the Canadian Society for Medical Laboratory science.
Practice varies significantly across the globe, and it is a requirement that all practitioners in Canada meet the rigorous entry-to-practice requirement, putting patient safety first at all times. A system that allows for additional training or practise in the Canadian context that is accessible, affordable, and reliable is imperative. We recognize and applaud the federal government for its continued work to accelerate and expand the assessment of internationally educated health professionals, and we look forward to continuing the momentum.
We're excited to hear about proposed changes to the immigration system that may require credential assessments pre-arrival. This step will allow newcomers to better understand the process and be matched to Canada before they get here. We were very pleased to see the recent announcement of the launch of the foreign credential recognition program loans pilot, and we hope that through this initiative, medical lab professionals will benefit as well.
We recently released key research findings on barriers faced by internationally educated health professionals in fulfilling their entry-to-practice standards in Canada. This project was funded by the Government of Canada's foreign credential recognition program and involved four other professions. The research highlighted that without a doubt the integration of internationally educated health professionals has benefited from recent attention and investment in the past several years, but it is also clear that internationally educated health professionals will benefit from further initiatives that will help to ease the future impact of our health human resource problems.
In addition to greater opportunities for clinical placements, it was clearly indicated by internationally educated health practitioners that a number of supports would definitely expedite the integration process. The majority of survey respondents were not able to participate in formal bridging or mentorship programs. Instead, they have to develop their own ad hoc system in Canada to help navigate the tenuous first few years of their careers in Canada.
Another report we released concluded that bridging programs shorten the time for internationally educated medical technologists to become certified in Canada, decrease their financial hardships, increase their taxation contributions, and expedite their integration into the Canadian workplace.
Targeted long-term sustainable investments are needed for the bridging programs. Success rates on the national exam are clearly higher for those who complete bridging programs.
Currently there is but one bridging program in Canada that serves 11 students a year with clinical placements, and it's located in Hamilton. With targeted investment, qualified professionals can enter the workforce more quickly to provide laboratory testing to Canadians.
In conclusion, I would like to highlight three broad categories of action as recommendations. First, develop additional training and support suited to the needs of internationally educated health professionals before and after licensure. Second, investigate how to improve the overall access and availability of clinical placements. Third, conduct future research into the reasons why a number of applicants do not complete the assessment process and ultimately fail to become licensed and work in their professions.
Strong investments today will help to ease the future impact of the shortage of medical laboratory technologists tomorrow.
Thank you.