Advisement of New Law Regarding Additional Signage and ID Requirements for All Health Professions
As many of you know, last legislative session, a bill was passed requiring that all healthcare providers be mandated provide additional identification regarding their profession. There are several ways to meet the new bill's requirement. The bill, which went into effect January 1, 2012, requires that all practitioners either: 1. wear a photo ID which includes their full name and their licensure, or 2. provide this information in writing to all new patients. On your office doors and on your websites, practitioners must now also be identified by full name AND LICENSURE (e.g., "John Q. Smith, Ph.D., Psychologist"), in letters at least one inch in height. Click here to review the full details of the bill.
A Message From the TPA Board: Please Support APAPO!
The Tennessee Psychological Association asks that you support the Tennessee Psychological Association AND APA and paying the APA Practice Assessment.
WHO PAYS THE ASSESSMENT:
Licensed APA members who provide health or mental health services or supervise those who do pay the Practice Assessment, which supports the work of APA Practice Organization on behalf of professional psychology. The Practice Assessment is included in a separate section in the APA member dues statements. The base Practice Assessment amount is $140 for 2011, as noted on the APA dues statements
WHY PAY THE ASSESSMENT:
As a quick review: It's not every day that you see a legal team with a track record of 100% success, but that's the case with the Legal & Regulatory Affairs Office of the APA Practice Organization ( APAPO).
APAPO attorneys (supported through our Practice Assessment payments) have been bringing lawsuits against managed care abuses for the last 15 years, working through collaborations with state associations.
As a medium state, the Practice Assessment portion of your APA dues is pooled, and helps support Tennessee as well as other state, provincial and territorial psychological associations. This grant money helps to insure that EVERY SPTA state has a formed and INFORMED association that manages the profession on a local level. The practice assessment money awards legislative grants to ALL SPTAS and organizational development grants to small and very small SPTAs to help keep a basic office infrastructure in place. APA is not able to work alone and stay aware of issues that affect the profession on a state to state to level without every SPTA having a central organization.
EACH MAJOR PIECE OF LITIGATION HAS RESULTED IN A FAVORABLE SETTLEMENT WITH MONETARY BENEFITS AND/OR POLICY IMPROVEMENTS!
Download PDF's of Presentation files for the TPA Convention 2011 seminars you attended RIGHT HERE (by seminar number):
Almost 86% of prescriptions for psychotropic drugs in Tennessee are written by primary care physicians. In part, this is because the wait for a first appointment with a psychiatrist in Tennessee can be almost 3 months, and up to 30% of psychiatrists are not taking new patients. And so many people with psychological difficulties are "over-medicated and under-treated." The solution is comprehensive treatment: Prescribing Psychologists, who have completed several years of additional training in psychopharmacology after their doctoral degree, who can provide both psychotherapy along with appropriate medication as needed. Learn more about TPA's public information campaign, "Becky's Story," based on a true story, depicting the tragic consequences of the current lack of comprehensive mental health treatment in Tennessee:
APA Division 55 2009 Mid-Winter Conference/TPA National RxP Advocacy Conference A Tremendous Success!
Dual Keynote Addresses by James Bray, Ph.D., APA President and Pat DeLeon, Ph.D., former APA President and Godfather of the National RxP Movement
Deborah Chandler Baker, J.D., APAPO Director for Prescriptive Authority
Morgan Sammons, Ph.D., APA Division 55 President
And many other national and state leaders in RxP
Make Your Life Easier: Make Managed Care Companies Approve at least 12 Sessions at a Time
This past legislative session, TPA was successful in passing a utilization review bill that no other state yet has passed. The bill "trumps" ERISA, so that insurance companies cannot claim that they are exempt from the bill because of their ERISA status. The bill says that, if an insurance company engages in utilization review on one of your patients, then it has one of two choices: it can take the position that no further treatment is medically necessary (in which case you appeal the decision), or they can approve more sessions. IF they approve ANY more sessions, then they must approve A MINIMUM OF 12 SESSIONS prior to the next utilization review. The bill went into effect July 1, 2007.
Our initial experience, as we suspect is yours, is that managed care companies (many of them out of state) are either ignorant of the bill or are ignoring it. To that end, we would like to provide you a tool with which to make your life easier: a letter to attach to all your utilization review requests in the short term, informing the managed care company of their obligations under Tennessee law. We hope that if we all use this, it will markedly improve their "compliance" with our new law.
To download a copy of the letter from the TPA Legislative Directorate to send with your utilization review forms, just click here (pdf format).
If you would like a copy of the new legislation itself, listing the revisions to the original utilization review law, just click here (pdf format).
If you would like to review the original legislation regarding minimum standards for "Utilization Review Agents" (TCA 56-6-705), click here for a link to Tennessee Code Annotated (regrettably, this only works reliably with Internet Explorer)
TPA OBTAINS TWO IMPORTANT ADVISORY OPINIONS FROM BOE REGARDING MEDICATIONS, SLEEP DISORDERS
At the suggestion of the legislative directorate, the TPA Board recently voted to seek, and just recently obtained, the following two Advisory Opinions, which have been approved by the State Office of General Counsel:
DISCUSSING AND RECOMMENDING MEDICATIONS, ETC. The first BOE Opinion reads as follows:
Practitioners of psychology may discuss with an established patient and/or patient family member and/or recommend to a patient’s physician any drug(s), laboratory test(s), or any medicine(s), devices(s), or treatment(s) including controlled substances rational to the practice of psychology, when such recommendation is within the boundaries of his or her competence based on his or her education, training, or appropriate professional experience. It is then incumbent on the physician, based upon all of the evidence before him or her, including the recommendations of the psychology practitioner, to decide what, if any, medication or medical assessment and/or treatment to prescribe. While practitioners of psychology may discuss medication issues with a patient, these practitioners of psychology acknowledge that a patient’s physician is the only person who may lawfully prescribe the medication or other medical test or treatment for the patient.
This opinion, which endorsed the language proposed by TPA, makes Tennessee the 14th state to date to obtain explicit permission for its practitioners to discuss medications and other medical issues with their patients. We are also proud of the fact that the wording of this statement is the strongest and broadest in the nation to date.
SCOPE OF PRACTICE: SLEEP DISORDERS: The second BOE Opinion reads as follows:
That it is fully within the scope of practice of a practitioner of psychology, as defined by TCA 63-11-203, to evaluate and treat, without supervision, the full range of “sleep disorders” as defined by the most current edition of The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders of the American Psychiatric Association (DSM) (within the restrictions on methods of treatment delineated in TCA 63-11-204).
It is recognized that some Psychologists have developed specialty knowledge and skills relevant to sleep disorders as reflected by their acquisition of status as a Diplomate of the American Board of Sleep Medicine (D,ABSM). It is fully within the scope of practice of a Psychologist in Tennessee, who is a Diplomate of the American Board of Sleep Medicine, to “read” or interpret, without supervision, a polysomnogram (NPSG, MSLT, MWT, or other “sleep study”), including making recommendations to physicians regarding treatment options indicated based on the findings of said sleep study.
This opinion, which also endorsed the language proposed by TPA with very minor revisions, was requested by TPA based on the experience of some members who have been told by hospital credentialing committees and/or by insurance payors that sleep disorders were outside our scope of practice. This statement unequivocally rebuts this assertion.
We are very pleased by these opinions—they reflect a BOE which is enlightened both about contemporary psychology practice and also about what is truly in the best interests of the citizens of Tennessee. If you have any questions regarding these opinions, please feel free to contact us at legislative.advocacy@tpaonline.org.
Volunteers Wanted!
We are always looking for members who are willing to volunteer their time to help make TPA an even more effective organization. Currently we are particularly looking to fill the following positions; if you are interested, please contact us at: admin@tpaonline.org:
Members willing to help in TPA's political advocacy work (Legislative Advocates)
Ethics Committee Members, especially Senior LPE's
Key Constituents (members willing to serve as designated liasons between TPA and their own legislators)
Disaster Response Network (DRN) members
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Tennessee Psychological Association
P.O. Box 281296
Memphis, Tennessee 38168
