| --Type Summary Here-- |
| AB 1943 - Amended April 23, 2002 |
| What Assembly Bill 1943 Does |
| Background Information for 3,200 hour training program standard |
| Legislative Counsel's Digest |
| Submit Your Questions about AB 1943 |
| What Assembly Bill 1943 Does |
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Expands training programs to 3,000 Hours for students entering school after January 1, 2004. |
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States that it is the Legislative intent to expands training programs to 4,000 hours for students entering school by 2010. |
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Requires currently Licensed Acupuncturists to attend 450 hours of continuing education over the next ten years. |
| FAQS (Frequently Asked Questions) |
| Background Information for 3,000 hour training program standard |
| The Acupuncture Board's Professional Competencies and Educational Outcomes Task Force, composed of nine representatives of the acupuncture profession, and nine repesentatives of acupuncture training institutes, met five times over the past six months, reviewing competencies, and developing a list of specified hours or subject matter that would meet those competencies. The outcome was a range of 3,150 to 3,950 hours, which was then revised down to 3,000 hours at the insistence of the schools so as not to interfere with the financial viability of their upcoming post-graduate research doctoral programs. The 3,150 - 3,850 range did not include some subject matter that was added later, so could easily have been more. |
| Legislative Counsel's Digest |
| AB 1943, as amended, Chu. Acupuncture. |
| Existing law, the Acupuncture Licensure Act, regulates the practice and licensure of acupuncture and establishes the Acupuncture Board to enforce and administer these provisions. Existing provisions of the act require the board to establish standards for the approval of schools and colleges offering education and training in the practice of an acupuncturist. This bill would specify minimum hours of study and practice in training programs that the board would require and would apply to all students entering programs on or before January 1, 2004. The bill would require an acupuncturist licensed prior to January 1, 2003, to complete 450 hours of continuing education courses in acupuncture by January 1, 2013, to renew his or her license . |
| Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no . |
| If you have further questions about AB 1943, please submit them to AB1943@acucouncil.org |
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| AB 1943 - Original Version - February 14, 2002 |
| What Assembly Bill 1943 Does |
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Replaces "acupuncture" with "acupuncture and oriental medicine," adding "oriental medicine" where applicable in certain sections of the law |
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Redefines the unlawful practice of acupuncture by removing redundant use of term "application of a needle." |
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Further protects terms and titles identified with the practice of acupuncture and oriental medicine. Prevents anyone other than a Licensed Acupuncturist from using the term "Chinese herbal medicine" or "doctor of oriental medicine" to describe their professional practice. |
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Sets existing legal opinion to "diagnose" into statutory law, by adding "to diagnose within the scope of acupuncture and oriental medicine," which is already allowed under legal opinions issued by the Department of Consumer Affairs. |
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Expands the scope of practice to include terms "administer" and "dispense" to the methods of usage of existing modalities and procedures, which are commonly practiced under existing law. |
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Allows the Acupuncture Board to accept equivalency for training obtained within the United States and Canada from schools that are not CA approved. |
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Expands training programs to 3,200 Hours by 2007 and 4,000 hours by 2011, raising and standardizing curriculum requirements to better qualify graduates to enter the profession. The last such upgrade went into effect in 1985. (Note: This section of the bill is designed to be amended to reflect the recommendations of the Acupuncture Board's Professional Competencies and Educational Outcomes Task Force, due on April 24, 2002.) |
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Requires clinical faculty to have five (5) years experience in practice, a very reasonable standard for better clinical instructors, preventing schools from hiring recent inexperienced graduates to teach clinic. |
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Permits the Acupuncture Board to require training programs maintain constant compliance with laws, correcting problem of an exisitng lack of continued review of schools for compliance with standards. |
| What Assembly Bill 1943 Does Not Do |
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AB 1943 does not allow existing Licensed Acupuncturists to use the title "Doctor of Oriental Medicine" unless otherwise qualified under existing requirements that they must demonstrate that they have a legitimate degree, title, or certificate granting such a title. |
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AB 1043 does not significantly expand the existing scope of practice of Licensed Acupuncturists. Acupuncturists have been making diagnoses based upon ancient oriental medicine paradigms (zang-fu, ba gang, wu xing, jing-luo, etc), as well as modern oriental medicine principles that have adopted the use of International Classification of Diseases as a standardized medical language. Existing legal opinion supports this. Prior to 1979, patients required a diagnosis and referral from a physician. Since that time, acupuncturists have been expected to diagnose according to the same standards and uniformity that our patients were diagnosed prior to 1979 by physicians, and to the same standards that exist across all health care professions. |
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AB 1943 does not require existing students or licensees to return for more education. However, this has been an interesting topic of discussion that applies to all healthcare professions. Physicians have been considering what to do in light of the fact that technology and pharmaceutical advances have changed the face of medicine drastically in the past thirty years. Representatives of the acupuncturist profession have offered to do whatever is necessary to assure that existing licensees continue to demonstrate competency, should the Department of Consumer Affairs or the Legislature require it. We have suggested increasing continuing education requirements as a partial solution. Or, licensees could demonstrate competency through evidence of additional education, specialized clinical experience, or competency examinations. Returning to school for a significant number of hours is simply impractical for most licensees. |
| Legislative Counsel's Digest |
| AB 1943, as introduced, Chu. Acupuncture. |
| Existing law, the Acupuncture Licensure Act, regulates the practice and licensure of acupuncture and establishes the Acupuncture Board to enforce and administer these provisions. |
| This bill would include the practice of oriental medicine as an aspect of acupuncture for purposes of licensure. |
| Existing provisions of the act also require the board to establish standards for the approval of schools and colleges offering education and training in the practice of an acupuncturist. |
| This bill would specify minimum hours of study and practice in specified areas that the board would be required to set. The bill would require a member of clinical faculty to have 5 years experience as a licensed acupuncturist and would provide that board approval of schools and colleges is valid for a period determined by the board, not to exceed 4 years. The bill would also require the board to establish a review process and would authorize the board to revoke, suspend, or otherwise place conditions upon a school or college if the entity fails to meet the requisite criteria at any time. |
| Existing provisions of the act make any person, other than a physician and surgeon, dentist, or podiatrist, who is not a licensed acupuncturist, guilty of a misdemeanor for the practice of acupuncture or acupuncture technique involving the application of a needle to the human body, or for the direction, management, or supervision of another person doing so. The act also makes it a misdemeanor for an unlicensed person to hold himself or herself out as engaging in the practice of acupuncture. |
| This bill would delete the requirement that acupuncture or technique practiced involve the application of a needle to the human body in order for the act to be a misdemeanor. The bill would also add the titles "doctor of oriental medicine" and "Chinese herbal medicine" as terms the use of which constitute holding oneself out as engaging in acupuncture. |
| By expanding the scope of unlicensed practice of acupuncture and by adding titles that are prohibited to be used by an unlicensed person, the bill would expand existing crimes and impose a state-mandated local program. |
| The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. |
| This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason. |
| Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: yes. |