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2017 SESSION

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Senate Committee on Education and Health
Subcommittee Certificate of Public Need (COPN)

Newman (Chairman), Saslaw, Lucas, Barker, Cosgrove, Dunnavant, Chase, Suetterlein

Clerk: Patty Lung, Rhonda Johnson
Staff: Thomas Stevens
Date of Meeting: February 2, 2017
Time and Place:

S.B. 1141

Patron: Sturtevant

Certificate of public need; psychiatric beds and services. Repeals the requirement for a certificate of public need for certain projects involving mental hospitals or psychiatric hospitals and intermediate care facilities established primarily for the medical, psychiatric, or psychological treatment and rehabilitation of individuals with substance abuse. The bill creates a new permitting process for such projects, exempted from the certificate of public need process, that requires the Commissioner of Health to issue a permit upon the agreement of the applicant to certain charity care conditions and quality of care standards.

S.B. 1375

Patron: Cosgrove

Certificate of Public Need program. Makes changes to the Medical Care Facilities Certificate of Public Need program. The bill (i) removes specialized centers or clinics or that portion of a physician's office developed for the provision of lithotripsy, magnetic source imaging (MSI), or nuclear medicine imaging from the list of reviewable medical care facilities; (ii) provides that establishment of a medical care facility to replace an existing medical care facility with the same primary service area does not constitute a project; (iii) removes introduction into an existing medical care facility of any new lithotripsy, MSI, or obstetrical service that the facility has never provided or has not provided in the previous 12 months and addition by an existing medical care facility of any medical equipment for the provision of lithotripsy and MSI from the definition of project; (iv) creates a new process for registration of projects exempted from the definition of project by the bill; (v) establishes an expedited 45-day review process for applicants for projects determined to be uncontested or to present limited health planning impacts; (vi) renames the State Medical Facilities Plan as the State Health Services Plan and establishes a State Health Services Plan Advisory Council to provide recommendations related to the content of the State Health Services Plan; (vii) clarifies the content of the application for a certificate; and (viii) reduces the timeline for a person to be made party to the case for good cause from 80 calendar days to four days following completion of the review and submission of recommendations related to an application.

The bill also (a) directs the Department to develop recommendations to reduce the duration of the average review cycle for applications for certificates of public need to not more than 120 days and to report on its recommendations to the Governor and the General Assembly no later than December 1, 2017; (b) directs the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to review charity care services delivered throughout the Commonwealth and recommend changes to the definition of charity and to the types of charity care requirements imposed on various health care services and report to the Governor and the General Assembly by December 1, 2017; (c) directs the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to convene a group of stakeholders to study and make recommendations related to the appropriate authority of the State Health Commissioner to impose additional conditions on certificates; (d) directs the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to implement a system to ensure that data needed to evaluate whether an application for a certificate is consistent with the State Health Services Plan is timely and reliable, to make all public records pertaining to applications for certificates and the review process available in real time in a searchable, digital format online, to make an inventory of capacity authorized by certificates of public need, both operational and not yet operational, available in a digital format online, and to make charity care conditions, charity care compliance reporting status, and details on the exact amount of charity care provided or contributed and to whom it was provided or contributed available in a digital format online; (e) directs the Commissioner of Health to develop an analytical framework to guide the work of the State Health Services Plan Advisory Council; and (f) directs the Joint Commission on Health Care to develop specific recommendations for eliminating differences in the certificate of public need review process from one region to another and report on the recommendations to the Chairmen of the House Committee on Health, Welfare and Institutions and Senate Committee on Education and Health by December 1, 2017.

S.B. 1566

Patron: Dunnavant

Certificate of public need; reports. Makes changes to the Medical Care Facilities Certificate of Public Need Program. The bill (i) removes psychiatric facilities, specialized centers or clinics or that portion of a physician's office developed for the provision of ambulatory or outpatient surgery, lithotripsy, magnetic source imaging (MSI), or nuclear medicine imaging, and certain specialized centers or clinics or portions of hospitals for the provision of neonatal special care services from the list of reviewable medical care facilities; (ii) provides that establishment of a medical care facility to replace an existing medical care facility with the same primary service area does not constitute a project; (iii) removes introduction into an existing medical care facility of any new lithotripsy, magnetic source imaging, or obstetrical service that the facility has never provided or has not provided in the previous 12 months and addition by an existing medical care facility of any medical equipment for the provision of lithotripsy and magnetic source imaging (MSI) from the definition of project; (iv) creates a new process for registration of projects exempted from the definition of project by the bill; (v) establishes an expedited 45-day review process for applicants for projects determined to be uncontested or to present limited health planning impacts; (vi) renames the State Medical Facilities Plan as the State Health Services Plan and establishes a State Health Services Plan Advisory Council to provide recommendations related to the content of the State Health Services Plan; (vii) clarifies the content of the application for a certificate; and (viii) reduces the timeline for a person to be made party to the case for good cause from 80 calendar days to four days following completion of the review and submission of recommendations related to an application.

The bill also (a) directs the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to review charity care services delivered throughout the Commonwealth and recommend changes to the definition of charity and to the types of charity care requirements imposed on various health care services and report to the Governor and the General Assembly by December 1, 2017; (b) directs the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to implement a system to ensure that data needed to evaluate whether an application for a certificate is consistent with the State Health Services Plan is timely and reliable, to make all public records pertaining to applications for certificates and the review process available in real-time in a searchable, digital format online, to make an inventory of capacity authorized by certificates of public need, both operational and not yet operational, available in a digital format online, and to make charity care conditions, charity care compliance reporting status, and details on the exact amount of charity care provided or contributed and to whom it was provided or contributed available in a digital format online; (c) directs the Commissioner of Health to develop an analytical framework to guide the work of the State Health Services Plan Advisory Council; and (d) directs the Joint Commission on Health Care to develop specific recommendations for eliminating differences in the certificate of public need review process from one region to another and report on the recommendations to the Chairmen of the House Health, Welfare and Institutions and Senate Education and Health Committees by December 1, 2017.