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1999 SESSION


HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 682
Directing the Joint Commission on Health Care to study the need to collect workforce data on nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and certified nurse aides.

Agreed to by the House of Delegates, February 9, 1999
Agreed to by the Senate, February 18, 1999

WHEREAS, quality health care depends on geographic and demographic access to competent health care professionals; and

WHEREAS, the General Assembly passed legislation during the 1998 Session requiring the Board of Medicine to collect, compile, and disseminate, upon request, information on the practice of each physician licensed in the Commonwealth; and

WHEREAS, the Board of Nursing knows how many health care nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and certified nurse aides are regulated and where they live, but has little or no information on whether they actively practice, any areas of specialty they may have, or their practice demographics; and

WHEREAS, there are various private efforts to collect geographic and demographic data on the practice of nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and certified nurse aides, but these efforts are not coordinated; and

WHEREAS, this lack of coordination of data-collection efforts makes it difficult to demonstrate the access Virginians have to nurses and other nursing-field professionals, or to identify any areas that may have access problems; and

WHEREAS, nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, and registered nurses play a vital role in Virginia’s health care delivery system and frequently are the patient’s point of entry into the health care system; and

WHEREAS, nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, and registered nurses provide primary and preventive care; and

WHEREAS, the General Assembly, state agencies, and other public policy makers frequently are called upon to make decisions that affect or are affected by geographic and demographic access to health care for Virginians; and

WHEREAS, health care decision makers in the private sector also make decisions that are influenced by geographical access to health care; and

WHEREAS, since this geographic and demographic information only recently has become available about physicians in the Commonwealth, but is not available about nurses and other nursing field professionals, public policy and business decisions often must be made based on inadequate information or assumptions that may or may not be accurate; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, That the Joint Commission on Health Care be directed to study the need to collect workforce data on nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and certified nurse aides.

The Joint Commission’s study shall include, but not be limited to, an examination of (i) what data are currently available on these regulated nurses and other nursing-field professionals; (ii) where gaps exist in current data collection efforts; (iii) what other states are doing in the area of data collection on nurses and other nursing-field professionals; (iv) what additional specific geographic, demographic or other information on nurses and other nursing-field professionals would enable the public and private sectors to make more-informed health care policy and business decisions; (v) what additional kinds of data on nurses and other nursing-field professionals would be the most useful; (vi) the various mechanisms that could be utilized to collect these data; and (vii) the cost of collecting any data deemed useful. The Joint Commission shall also recommend what data, if any, should be collected; the most efficient method to collect, compile, and analyze such data; and, based on an analysis of the costs and benefits of such information, whether the Commonwealth should participate in this data collection. The Joint Commission shall request the Legislative Coalitions of Virginia Nurses and its member organizations to assist with and participate in this study.

All agencies of the Commonwealth shall provide assistance to the Joint Commission, upon request.

The Joint Commission shall complete its work in time to submit its findings and recommendations to the Governor and the 2000 Session of the General Assembly as provided in the procedures of the Division of Legislative Automated Systems for the processing of legislative documents.