THE CONTINUING EDUCATION PROGRAM

The Continuing Education Program

The Continuing Education Program provides education to massage therapists in a variety of hands-on workshops and lecture-based seminars across Ontario focused on three main areas—Competency, Business, and Modality. The Continuing Education Program is designed to help massage therapists increase their knowledge base to continuously improve for both their own personal success and that of the client.

Competency-based courses are education sessions designed to ensure that massage therapists remain current with respect to the competencies of the profession as they continue to evolve over time. They also elevate the standard of care massage therapists provide to their clients. Competency based education sessions help massage therapists to consistently upgrade their knowledge and skills, and ensure that the members are not only meeting the current Standards of Practice, Regulations and Policies and Position Statements of the College of Massage Therapists of Ontario but also engaging in an atmosphere of quality improvement and best practices.  The mantra of "excellence in care" is paramount to the profession of massage therapy.

Business courses are designed to provide practitioners the skills, support and systems necessary to sustain a massage therapy practice in Ontario.  Business based education is focused on the ability of the practitioner to establish and sustain a practice as opposed to the furthering their understanding of treatments.  They provide a sound foundation for career longevity and a successful health care practice.

Modality-based courses are courses and workshops designed to take a more hands-on approach to education.  Sessions are designed based on the "in scope" and complementary modalities identified by the College of Massage Therapists of Ontario.  Modality-based education is practice based and offers massage therapists the opportunity to integrate additional modalities into a massage therapy treatment plan for the benefit of the client.

Why Continuing Competency is so Important

Massage therapist practice in a variety of settings, including clinical, administrative, education and research roles, which can often be overlapping.  The massage therapists' practice environment is constantly changing in terms of resources, expectations and emerging technologies.  It is critical that practitioners continue to develop knowledge and competence throughout their careers.
 
Registered Massage Therapists are accountable to the public to promote safe, ethical and competent care throughout their careers and to continually acquire competence in their practice.  Increasingly, the public demands assurance of continuing competence from all health professions.  In an age of disappearing borders, continuing competence of health professionals is a global concern.  The importance of this was underscored by the changes the Government of Ontario made to the Regulated Health Professions Act in 2007.
 

Continuing competence is the ongoing ability of the registered massage therapist to integrate and apply the knowledge, skills, judgment and personal attributes required to practice safely and ethically in a designated role and setting.  Maintaining this ongoing ability involved a continual process linking the code of ethics, standards of practice and life-long learning.  Continuing competence promotes effective massage therapy, assists in preventing poor practice, and contributes to the quality of practice and best possible client outcomes.   It enables the massage therapist to base their practice on the most recent and strongest evidence necessary to produce high quality client outcomes.  Continuous learning requires Registered Massage Therapists to reflect on their competencies in relation to the changes occurring in society and the health care environment and, as a result, take action to re-educate themselves on the very competencies that were learned in school to guarantee that as the competencies evolve so to does the skill base of the Massage therapist.

2011 RMTAO Continuing Education Survey Results

The RMTAO surveyed members about all aspects of Continuing Education. This information is vital in our development and planning of our continuing education program, The  Learning Curve. Through member input and suggestions, we can better tailor our programs in order to continually provide RMTs with the highest calibre of continuing education in Ontario.

The results of the survey are below.

 Download 2011 Continuing Education Survey Results (PDF)