Protecting patients through professional regulation: Audit of registration of nutritional therapy practitioners via a grandparenting process

IntroductionRegistration of practitioners of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has been proposed as an important measure towards assuring the safety of individuals choosing to use therapies that are outside the practice of mainstream medicine. The Nutritional Therapy Council, an independent body established by a group of professional associations representing nutritional therapists, with funding from the UK Department of Heath, launched a voluntary national registration scheme in 2006 for practitioners of nutritional therapy, a bioscience-based branch of CAM.MethodsRegistrant data for 2006–2009 were audited for age, gender, years in practice, route of registration according to qualification compared to National Occupational Standards. Records were audited for patient safety complaints.ResultsAudit of the scheme demonstrated that the majority of applicants had formal training to the level of the NOS, most had been in practice for less than 10 years and the cohort was predominantly female, with a mean age of 45 years. The small number of unsuccessful applications for registration may demonstrate that a high degree of self-selection of applicants operated. No complaints against practitioners were received during the duration of the scheme.ConclusionThis practitioner registration scheme enabled over 600 Nutritional Therapy practitioners to demonstrate alignment to the National Occupational Standards (NOS). Safe, effective, lawful practice was demonstrated through verified qualification, or by assessment of a portfolio of evidence, including evidence-based clinical case studies. Professional registration has an important role in patient safety by providing potential users of complementary medicine with information on qualified competent practitioners.This article belongs to the Special Issue: Clinical Guidelines.