Bill Text: NJ A3054 | 2018-2019 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: Requires hospitals to maintain passive audio or visual mechanism for alerting emergency department staff to presence of non-ambulance vehicles containing patients.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 1-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2018-02-08 - Introduced, Referred to Assembly Health and Senior Services Committee [A3054 Detail]
Download: New_Jersey-2018-A3054-Introduced.html
Sponsored by:
Assemblywoman NANCY F. MUNOZ
District 21 (Morris, Somerset and Union)
SYNOPSIS
Requires hospitals to maintain passive audio or visual mechanism for alerting emergency department staff to presence of non-ambulance vehicles containing patients.
CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT
As introduced.
An Act concerning hospital emergency departments and supplementing Title 26 of the Revised Statutes.
Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:
1. A general hospital licensed pursuant to P.L.1971, c.136 (C.26:2H-1 et seq.) shall maintain a continuous passive audio or visual mechanism for alerting emergency department staff, at any time of the day, to the presence of a non-ambulance vehicle in the ambulance bay or emergency parking lot that contains a person seeking emergency medical care.
2. The Commissioner of Health, pursuant to the "Administrative Procedure Act," P.L.1968, c.410 (C.52:14B-1 et seq.), shall adopt rules and regulations to effectuate the purposes of this act.
3. This act shall take effect on the 180th day after enactment, but the Commissioner of Health may take such anticipatory administrative action in advance thereof as shall be necessary for the implementation of this act.
STATEMENT
This bill requires each licensed general hospital in the State to maintain a continuous passive audio or visual mechanism for alerting its emergency department staff, at any time of the day, to the presence of a non-ambulance vehicle in the ambulance bay or emergency parking lot that contains a person seeking emergency medical care.
The purpose of this bill is to ensure that emergency department personnel are alerted to situations in which a patient in need of emergency care arrives at the hospital in a vehicle other than an ambulance but is unable to exit the vehicle and enter the emergency department. The alert mechanism required under the bill will help ensure that such patients receive prompt, timely, and appropriate care, regardless of the manner in which they arrive at the hospital or whether they arrive during ordinary business hours.
