Regulated Health Professions Act and dental hygiene : a study of the changing social organization of health care delivery in Ontario / Lynda McKeown Mickelson

Abstract

Has the new health legislation, the Regulated Health Professions Act, 1994. changed the social organization of health care delivery in Ontario? My research has shown that this new legislation, which governs twenty-four health professions, is a site of power relations. The seemingly mundane and ordinary practice of oral health care delivery is examined to find evidence of change in the social organization of health care. The relationship between two providers of services surrounding the mouth and oral health care, dental hygiene and dentistry exemplify the power relations and the inherent resistance emerging as the legislation is enacted. The evidence at this time indicates that the existing professional monopolies may not be disrupted easily, even with new legislation. The themes that emerged from the struggle to reframe the relations between dentistry and dental hygiene under the new R.H.P.A. are: discourse/language, professional dominance, technologies of bureaucracy, gender, and power/knowledge.