It gives us great pleasure to present the new CanMEDS-PA Framework. This past year CAPA underwent a formal review of our Physician Assistant (PA) National Competency Profile and Scope of Practice. With the introduction of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada’s (Royal College) new CanMEDS framework we felt it was best to model the PA National Competency Profile (NCP) to be in parallel with the national framework for physicians. Given that PAs are educated in the medical model and the close partnership between physicians and PAs, we felt that matching the PA competencies to their supervising physician’s was appropriate. Changes to be noted are the renaming of Manager to Leader in the Royal College CanMEDS framework. Some of the significant changes to the NCP by CAPA include changing the name to CanMEDS–PA, incorporating the change from Manager to Leader; the addition of 12 new competencies under the Medical Expert competency as well as emphasizing the Safety component of clinical practice.
These changes will allow the current and future Canadian accredited PA programs to appropriately model their curriculum to be in line with the desired skills and abilities necessary for an entry to practice PA.
Check it out online.