Can an Ontario Family Physician Advertise That They Are Accepting New Patients?

A family physician in Richmond Hill or anywhere else in the GTA who wants to tell people a roster spot has opened is not asking for a special exemption. The question is whether that message counts as advertising under the rules the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario already has in place, and if so, what it has to look like.

What CPSO’s Advertising Policy Actually Covers

CPSO’s Advertising policy defines advertising broadly: any paid or unpaid communication, made by the physician or by a third party on their behalf, that promotes the physician or a service they provide, or that communicates the availability of professional services. A “now accepting new patients” post or ad falls inside that definition. The policy applies whether the physician wrote the ad themselves or a marketing agency wrote it on their behalf.

Within that definition, CPSO sets out what an ad must do and what it must avoid.

An ad must be

• Readily comprehensible and dignified
• In good taste, meaning informational rather than heavily commercial in tone
• Accurate and factual
• Verifiable and supported by evidence, if it makes any clinical or statistical claim
• Respectful and balanced in tone, and consistent with the reputation of the profession

An ad must not

• Be false, misleading or exaggerated
• Disparage or discredit anyone
• Compare the physician to other physicians or health professionals
• Suggest a better or more effective service than another provider offers
• Include a testimonial
• Reference a specific drug, appliance or piece of equipment

None of this is specific to accepting new patients. It is the same standard CPSO applies to any physician advertisement, and a new patient announcement has to clear it like everything else.

General Availability Versus Targeting a Specific Person

CPSO’s Advertising policy separately prohibits proactively contacting, or attempting to contact, a specific person known to need medical services in order to solicit them, and prohibits taking part in an organized arrangement where another party directs someone toward a particular physician. A general announcement that a practice has openings is a different thing from either of those. It communicates availability to the public, it does not identify or target an individual, and CPSO’s own definition of advertising treats that kind of communication as ordinary advertising rather than solicitation.

The Accepting New Patients Policy: What You Can Say About Who You’ll Take

A second CPSO policy, Accepting New Patients, governs the substance of the message rather than its form. Physicians decide for themselves whether their practice is open to new patients and which patients to accept, and that decision has to be made in good faith. Physicians must not refuse a patient on any of the prohibited grounds set out in the Ontario Human Rights Code, and must not refuse a patient solely because of high or complex care needs, a history of prescribed opioid or psychotropic medication, needs that take extra time to manage, a disability, or beliefs that differ from the physician’s own.

Setting criteria in the ad itself

Physicians are permitted to set criteria for who they accept, for example a focus on a particular age group or a defined catchment area, but the criteria have to meet four conditions: they must be directly relevant to the physician’s clinical competence, scope of practice or focused practice area; they must comply with any conditions on the physician’s certificate of registration; they must be fair and support equitable access to care; and they must be clearly communicated to prospective patients. If an ad states a criterion, that statement is the communication CPSO expects, so it has to be accurate and applied consistently rather than used as a soft way to screen people out.

Where a Compliant CPSO Ad Still Meets Platform Rules

Clearing CPSO’s standard is necessary but not sufficient once the ad runs on Meta or Google. Both platforms apply their own, separate restrictions to health related advertising, and those restrictions sit on top of CPSO’s rules rather than replacing them. Meta’s advertising standards restrict an ad from asserting or implying that it knows something personal about the person viewing it, including a health condition, and apply closer review to ads from healthcare providers generally. Google’s advertising policies restrict targeting or personalization based on medical conditions, diseases or treatments, and place additional certification requirements on some categories of health advertising. Programs and specific requirements in this area change fairly often on both platforms, so the constraint to plan around is the general one: expect closer review and less targeting precision than a non-health campaign, not a fixed set of rules that will still read the same next year.

What This Looks Like for a GTA Family Practice

We work with family physicians, walk in clinics, dental practices and med spas from our Richmond Hill office, running compliance aware advertising for clinics across the GTA. Clients keep ownership of their own ad accounts, the arrangement is month to month, and ad copy for a regulated practice is drafted against the CPSO wording currently in force before it goes anywhere near a campaign. If you want that review built into how your clinic’s advertising is handled, that is part of our marketing work for medical clinics across the GTA.

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For a family practice specifically, that same roster-growth and Google Business Profile work is built out on the family physician marketing page. It sits alongside Google Ads management and local SEO built around the GTA map pack, both part of the full range of digital marketing services MetaBaz runs for GTA practices.

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None of this is legal advice, and it should not be treated as a substitute for it. CPSO policy is reviewed and updated periodically, most recently for the Accepting New Patients policy in May 2025, so specific campaign copy should be checked against the current published policy by the clinic or its own advisor before it runs.

Before You Publish the Ad

• Confirm the copy states availability rather than comparing your practice to another physician or clinic
• Remove any language that promises a better or more effective outcome than another provider
• If the ad states criteria for new patients, check each one is tied to your scope of practice and applied consistently, not just to a preferred type of patient
• Cut testimonials and references to specific drugs or equipment, which have no place in a new patient ad regardless
• Check the ad platform’s own health advertising rules before submitting, since a CPSO compliant ad can still be flagged on review
• Have the clinic or its advisor sign off before the campaign goes live