Health professionals' language capacity in Canada: a mixed qualitative analysis of regulatory data and implications for workforce planning.

BACKGROUND: Canada's official bilingualism aims to ensure equitable access to health services in English and French, yet official-language minority populations continue to face barriers to care. OBJECTIVE: To examine how provincial and territorial health profession regulatory authorities collect and publicly report official-language data, how practices vary across jurisdictions and professions, and how they have changed since 2017. METHODS: A mixed-methods environmental scan combined a follow-up survey of registrars with an updated review of publicly available registry information. Data were collected in summer 2024 across Canada's ten provinces and three territories for seven regulated health professions and compared descriptively with findings from 2017. RESULTS: In 2017, 48 of 89 regulatory authorities (54%) reported collecting official-language data from registrants and 22 (25%) made these data publicly available. In 2024, 43 of 83 authorities (52%) collected such data and 21 (25%) reported them publicly. Because the sampling frames differed and fewer authorities were included in 2024, changes in absolute numbers should be interpreted cautiously. Authorities regulating medicine, psychology and pharmacy were most likely to collect and disclose language data. Misinterpretation of privacy legislation and the absence of mandatory reporting requirements remained important barriers. Jurisdictions with minimum data standards, notably Ontario, demonstrated more consistent practices. CONCLUSIONS: The collection and public reporting of official-language data by Canadian health profession regulatory authorities have changed little since 2017. Standardised minimum requirements are needed to support equitable access to care and evidence-informed health workforce planning for official-language minority populations.