The pathetic saga of CAMTC continues. The Sunset hearing is scheduled for April 29. ABMP and AMTA are both in favor of sunsetting this organization and are working towards that end through their government relations people. What you can do, as a massage therapist, is send a letter to your representative ahead of the April 29 deadline. If you don’t know who your legislators are, you can find that out here. A letter template can be accessed here. You can also ask your clients to support this and encourage them to contact legislators as well.
California massage therapists deserve true licensing instead of this voluntary certification, which was never meant to be the final outcome from the beginning. It was seen as a stopgap measure until true licensing could be achieved. One wonders why the CAMTC is so against licensing. It may be they are happy with the money their executives are hauling in. You can see their 990 filing from 2023 here.
Regardless of the outcome of that, one can only hope that on June 2, justice will be served when the contempt of court hearing against CAMTC happens. It is unfortunate that the contempt of court hearing is not taking place before the sunset hearing.
There are now approximately 300 graduates from A2Z Health Massage School who have their certifications in limbo. They’ve completed school, paid their money to CAMTC, and are being denied certification by CAMTC. There are two court orders telling them to certify the graduates, the last one issued by the Superior Court, but they have not been complied with. The hearing on June 2 requires that the CAMTC explain why they are violating the court orders. It will be especially interesting since during the discovery process, the owners of A2Z found that a CAMTC employee who visited the school multiple times during surprise visits gave them good reviews.
Licensing boards exist for public protection. They exist to license those who meet the qualifications, to approve education, to investigate complaints, to work against human trafficking and the association of sex in the massage profession, and to give due process to consumers and to licensees. CAMTC has failed the due process part miserably. As I quoted in my last post, the order issued by the Superior Court states:
(1) By no later than April 4, 2025, the Council shall issue provisional certifications to each Petitioner. The provisional certifications shall remain effective until the final disposition of this action, subject to the Massage Therapy Act’s provisions for renewal (Bus. & Prof. Code, § 4605) and discipline (Bus. & Prof. Code, §§ 4609-4611).
(2) The Council is enjoined from withholding certification from any applicant based upon the Council’s investigation of and/or approval revocation proceedings against A2Z.
(3) The Council is enjoined from requiring any applicant to submit to any
investigatory process as a condition of certification, including interviews,
hearings, or submission of additional information, except for the sole purpose of determining whether the applicant has received the required education set forth in Business & Professions Code, § 4604, subd. (a)(2).)
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Graduates of this school who were called in for interviews stated that they were asked such questions as “Where is the school’s bathroom located?” and “What is beriberi?” Beriberi is a rather obscure disease caused by a deficiency in thiamine, that is most prevalent in indigenous populations in the Amazon, in infants in refugee camps, for example, and other places lacking adequate nutrition.¹ It is a rare occurrence in the US. As the author of a textbook on passing licensing exams that is in its 5th edition, I have never mentioned it in the pathology section. I’d be surprised if it’s a question on the MBLEx, other state exams, or the Board Certification Exam. If knowledge of beriberi is the benchmark for the safe and effective practice of massage therapy, a lot of us are probably in trouble.
Please act on this immediately by writing your legislators. April 29 is looming, and if this doesn’t happen now, there will not be another opportunity for four more years. It’s time to support real licensing in California.
- Geoffrey A. Preidis, 81 – Nutrition-Associated Disease, Editor(s): Jeremy Farrar, Patricia Garcia, Peter Hotez, Thomas Junghanss, Gagandeep Kang, David Lalloo, Nicholas White. Manson’s Tropical Diseases (Twenty-Fourth Edition),Elsevier, 2024, Pages 1161-1177. ISBN 9780702079597,Geoffrey A. Preidis,
81 – Nutrition-Associated Disease,
Editor(s): Jeremy Farrar, Patricia Garcia, Peter Hotez, Thomas Junghanss, Gagandeep Kang, David Lalloo, Nicholas White,
Manson’s Tropical Diseases (Twenty-Fourth Edition),
Elsevier, 2024, Pages 1161-1177,
ISBN 9780702079597,
https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-7020-7959-7.00081-6.