The following information was obtained from the February 15 issue of the Texas Register.
Proposed Rules
The Texas Board of Nursing proposed an amendment to §211.7, Executive Director, which would reduce the volume of requests that must be heard by the Eligibility and Disciplinary Committee of the Board and reduce and/or eliminate the amount of time that individuals must wait to have their matters heard and decided by the Committee.
The board also proposed to amend §220.2, Issuance of a License by a Compact Party State. An excerpt:
The [Nurse Licensure Compact ] formally amended the Compact Model Rules and Regulations on November 13, 2012. The Board is proposing amendments to §220.2(f) and (g) to implement these changes. Currently, under §220.2(f), a nurse who is changing his/her primary state of residence from one party state to another may continue to practice under his/her former home state license and multistate privilege during the processing of his/her application in his/her new home state, for a period not to exceed 30 days. This time period, however, is often an inadequate amount of time for new party states to complete the application process. Often, documents from other jurisdictions must be received and reviewed and educational requirements must be verified. If a particular state has a large volume of applications, this process can take longer than 30 days. In an effort to avoid requiring a nurse to cease practicing while his/her application is being processed, the proposed amendment to §220.2(f) provides a nurse an additional 60 days in which he/she may practice while his/her application remains pending with his/her new home state. It is anticipated that this additional time period will allow the new home state an appropriate amount of time to complete its application process and will permit nurses to continue working during the transition period into a new home state.
Rule Reviews
The Texas Board of Nursing filed this notice of intention to review and consider for readoption, readoption with amendments, or repeal the following chapters contained in Title 22, Part 11, of the Texas Administrative Code:
- Chapter 214, Vocational Nursing Education, §§214.1 – 214.13.
- Chapter 215, Professional Nursing Education, §§215.1 – 215.13.
- Chapter 222, Advanced Practice Registered Nurses with Prescriptive Authority, §§222.1 – 222.12.
See the Texas Register for more information, including where to submit comments.
