During the legislative session that ended last week, California’s Senate and Assembly members introduced a suite of bills that aim to expand access to primary care. Although a bill to expand nurse practitioners’ roles didn’t pass, three other measures survived and have moved to Gov. Jerry...
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) last week issued guidance interpreting its new requirements for admission and medical review criteria for hospital inpatient services under Medicare Part A. The five-page document clarifies the types of practitioners who may furnish orders...
Seventeen states and the District of Columbia currently allow nurse practitioners (NP) to work autonomously, but a bill to add California to the list has failed in the Legislature amid intense lobbying against it by the California Medical Association (CMA) and other powerful physician groups,...
Greater reliance on physician assistants (PA) and nurse practitioners (NP) is seen as one way to ameliorate the widening primary care physician shortage. However, data suggest that less than half of all PAs currently practice primary care and nearly half of NPs practice outside primary care,...
Three pieces of legislation related to expanding allied health practitioners’ scope of practice—Senate Bill (SB) 491, SB492, and SB493—have met differing fates in California State Assembly committees. Senate Bill 491, which would allow nurse practitioners to practice without physician oversight...
