Abstract
BACKGROUND: Across Canada, restaurant inspections are conducted to ensure that the food served to the public in almost all public eating facilities, is safe to consume and sell. The ratings and infractions correspond with the standards a restaurant is operating incompliance with legislation. There have been indications in the past of restaurants in different regions or serving specific types of food, receiving lower ratings than others. Currently, there is a lack of knowledge and research on the difference between major cities in Canada, regarding restaurant infractions. By focusing on Vancouver and Toronto restaurants, this research may provide insight into the different legislation of the two regions, highlight different Environmental Health Officers (EHOs) practices and ultimately provide information for knowledge translation into policies that these regions follow. METHODS: This research focused on "sit-down" restaurants located in the Vancouver downtown area and the Toronto downtown area. Only "routine" inspection report information was examined. There were a total of 200 restaurant inspection reports analyzed from 200 different restaurants, a 100 from each region. The study focused on two types of infractions from each region. Toronto: Crucial infractions and Minor infractions. Vancouver: Critical and Non-critical. Three, two-sample T-tests were conducted to compare the difference between the number of infractions. Data was collected from online restaurant inspection reports of each region. RESULTS: A total of three, two sample T-tests were conducted. This research found that: 1) there is a significant difference between the number of combined restaurant infractions in Toronto and the number of combined restaurant infractions in Vancouver, (P= 0.000). 2) there is a significant difference between the number of Crucial restaurant infractions in Toronto and the number of Critical restaurant infractions in Vancouver, (P= 0.000). 3) there is a significant difference between the number of Minor restaurant infractions in Toronto and the number of Non-critical restaurant infractions in Vancouver, (P= 0.001). CONCLUSION: The findings of this study determined that Vancouver restaurants had a significantly higher number of infractions (Combined, Critical, and Non-critical) when compared to Toronto restaurants. Although a statistically significant difference was found, further research is needed to discover the specific differences across Canada and even within cities. With this information, the method in which EHOs are taught and conduct their inspections, may need to be revised in the future.