5 February 2025
Governor Josh Shapiro has proposed a policy change to allow Nurse Practitioners in Pa. to practice without physician oversight.
The article, from WNEP Channel 16, quotes a nurse practitioner as saying “I practice in primary care. I pretty much do everything that a family practice physician can do, but I’m a family-practice nurse practitioner; there’s not much difference,” said Allyson Favuzza, a nurse practitioner at Hometown Healthcare.
In fact, she says there is little supervision in primary care.
This is the unfortunate truth for many nurse practitioners who are forced by state laws to have to have an collaborative agreement with a physician to be able to care for patients. Most states do not require the physician to have any actual supervision of the nurse practitioner, or see their patients. They just need to say they will be “available” if needed, not even on sight at any time ,
It’s time to admit the truth. That forcing nurse practitioners to have a collaborative agreement with physicians has less to do with quality patient care than it does making physicians money. There is over half a century of quality research showing that nurse practitioners provide high quality patient care, equal to and sometimes better than physicians. These antiquated laws that tether nurse practitioners to physicians inhibit access to care in all areas of every state.
In Florida, nurse practitioners are allowed to practice independently in certain circumstances, but are limited to primary care, general internal medicine, and pediatrics. The definition of “primary care” is different between the Board of Nursing (BON) and the Board of Medicine (BOM). The BON has chosen a limited scope in their definition, while the BOM has chosen a more broad, general definition. This causes confusion as to just exactly what nurse practitioners are able to do. Primary care is primary care, and should have a consistent definition, regardless of who provides it.
YOU can change this. Contact your state legislators and the Board of Nursing and voice your concerns that nurse practitioners are being hindered in their ability to provide high quality care to the fullest extent of their licensure and training!
