Bill Text: CA SB323 | 2015-2016 | Regular Session | Introduced

NOTE: There are more recent revisions of this legislation. Read Latest Draft

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Bill Title: Nurse practitioners: scope of practice.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 3-0)

Status: (Failed) 2016-11-30 - From Assembly without further action. [SB323 Detail]

Download: California-2015-SB323-Introduced.html

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BILL NUMBER: SB 323	INTRODUCED
	BILL TEXT


INTRODUCED BY   Senator Hernandez
   (Principal coauthor: Assembly Member Eggman)

                        FEBRUARY 23, 2015

   An act relating to healing arts.


	LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST


   SB 323, as introduced, Hernandez. Nurse practitioners.
   The Nursing Practice Act provides for the licensure and regulation
of nurse practitioners by the Board of Registered Nursing.
   This bill would make legislative findings and declarations with
respect to the importance of care provided by nurse practitioners.
   Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: no.
State-mandated local program: no.


THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:

  SECTION 1.  The Legislature finds and declares all of the
following:
   (a) Nurse practitioners are a longstanding, vital, safe,
effective, and important part of the state's health care delivery
system. They are especially important given California's shortage of
physicians, with just 16 of 58 counties having the federally
recommended ratio of physicians to residents.
   (b) Nurse practitioners will play an especially important part in
the implementation of the federal Patient Protection and Affordable
Care Act (Public Law 111-148), which will bring an estimated five
million more Californians into the health care delivery system,
because they will provide for greater access to primary care services
in all areas of the state. This is particularly true for patients in
medically underserved urban and rural communities.
   (c) Due to the excellent safety and efficacy record that nurse
practitioners have earned, the Institute of Medicine of the National
Academies has recommended full practice authority for nurse
practitioners. Currently, 20 states allow nurse practitioners to
practice to the full extent of their training and education.
   (d) Furthermore, nurse practitioners will assist in addressing the
primary care provider shortage by removing delays in the provision
of care that are created when dated regulations require a physician's
signature or protocol before a patient can initiate treatment or
obtain diagnostic tests that are ordered by a nurse practitioner.