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THE SENATE                           S.C.R. NO.            S.D. 1
TWENTIETH LEGISLATURE, 1999                                
STATE OF HAWAII                                            
                                                             
________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________


                    SENATE  CONCURRENT
                        RESOLUTION

  REQUESTING THE CONVENING OF A STATE TASK FORCE TO STUDY THE
    REGULATION OF THE HEALTH PROFESSIONS AND REPORT
    RECOMMENDATIONS TO BETTER PROTECT HEALTH CARE CONSUMERS. 


 1        WHEREAS, the President's Advisory Commission on Consumer
 2   Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry recommends
 3   that all sectors of the health care industry should support the
 4   focused development of quality measures that enhance and
 5   improve the ability to evaluate and improve health care and
 6   should include steps to ensure that comparative information on
 7   health care quality is valid, reliable, comprehensible, and
 8   widely available in the public domain; and
 9   
10        WHEREAS, a recent report issued in October of 1998
11   entitled "Strengthening Consumer Protection: Priorities for
12   Health Care Workforce Regulation" by the Task Force on Health
13   Care Workforce Regulation of the Pew Health Professions
14   Commission (Pew Commission) envisions a future health
15   professions regulatory system that meets consumers' reasonable
16   expectations of access to comprehensive, appropriate, cost-
17   effective and high quality health services and explores ways to
18   move the current system toward this future system; and
19   
20        WHEREAS, the Pew Commission acknowledges the challenge of
21   reforming a complex system and seeks with their report to
22   provide state legislators and regulators with a tool and
23   resource to understand and shape professional regulation so
24   that it meets evolving consumer protection needs; and
25   
26        WHEREAS, weaknesses in these regulatory structures have
27   been well documented and analyzed in national reports and
28   studies over the past twenty-five years indicating that the
29   professions need to guide their respective boards because
30   professional dominance on boards limits public accountability
31   and can promote self-interest in policymaking; and
32   
33        WHEREAS, although several professions and states have made
34   progress, national standards for entry to practice,
35   professional mobility, scopes of practices, continuing

 
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 1   competence, and discipline are still very limited; and
 2   
 3        WHEREAS, consumers' efforts to make informed decisions
 4   about practitioner competence are hindered by the poor and
 5   limited quality of information that boards release regarding
 6   licensees; and
 7   
 8        WHEREAS, the Pew Commission believes that state-based
 9   health care workforce regulation will best serve the public by
10   promoting effective health care outcomes and protecting the
11   public from harm by holding regulatory bodies accountable to
12   the public; and
13   
14        WHEREAS, the Pew Commission also believes that consumers'
15   rights to choose their health care providers from a range of
16   safe options should be respected; and
17   
18        WHEREAS, the Pew Commission further believes that the
19   state-based health care workforce regulation will encourage a
20   flexible, rational, and cost-effective health care system which
21   allows effective working relationships among health care
22   providers as well as facilitates professional and geographic
23   mobility of competent providers; and
24   
25        WHEREAS, the Pew Commission made numerous recommendations,
26   including but not limited to:
27   
28        (1)  Individual professional boards in the states must be
29             more accountable to the public by significantly
30             increasing the representation of public, non-
31             professional members;
32   
33        (2)  States should require professional boards to provide
34             practice-relevant information about their licensees
35             to the public in a clear and comprehensible manner;
36   
37        (3)  States should provide the resources necessary to
38             adequately staff and equip all health profession
39             boards to meet their responsibilities expeditiously,
40             efficiently, and effectively;
41   
42        (4)  States should explore and develop mechanisms for

 
 
 
 
 
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 1             existing professions to evolve their existing scopes
 2             of practice and for new professions (or previously
 3             unregulated professions) to emerge;
 4   
 5        (5)  States should use standardized and understandable
 6             language for health profession regulation and its
 7             function to clearly describe them for consumers,
 8             provider organizations, businesses, and the
 9             professions;
10   
11        (6)  States should base practice acts on demonstrated
12             initial and continuing competence;
13   
14        (7)  States should redesign health professional boards and
15             their functions to reflect the interdisciplinary and
16             public accountability demands of the changing health
17             care delivery system;
18   
19        (8)  Boards should educate consumers to assist them in
20             obtaining the information necessary to make decisions
21             about practitioners and to improve the boards' public
22             accountability;
23   
24        (9)  Boards should cooperate with other public and private
25             organizations in collecting data on regulated health
26             professions to support effective workforce planning;
27   
28       (10)  States should require each board to develop,
29             implement, and evaluate continuing competency
30             requirements to assure the continuing competence of
31             regulated health care professionals;
32   
33       (11)  States should maintain a fair, cost-effective, and
34             uniform disciplinary process to exclude incompetent
35             practitioners to protect and promote the public's
36             health;
37   
38       (12)  States should develop evaluation tools that assess
39             the objectives, successes, and shortcomings of their
40             regulatory systems and bodies in order to best
41             protect and promote the public's health; and
42   

 
 
 
 
 
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 1       (13)  States should understand the links, overlaps, and
 2             conflicts between their health care workforce
 3             regulatory system which affect the education,
 4             regulation, and practice of health care
 5             practitioners, and work to develop partnerships to
 6             streamline regulatory structures and processes;
 7   
 8   and
 9   
10        WHEREAS, the citizens of the "Health State" of Hawaii may
11   be better served through the study and potential implementation
12   of some or all of these recommendations which may improve the
13   quality of health care; now, therefore,
14   
15        BE IT RESOLVED by the Senate of the Twentieth Legislature
16   of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 1999, the House of
17   Representatives concurring, that the Director of Commerce and
18   Consumer Affairs is requested to convene a Health Profession
19   Regulation Task Force (Task Force) to review the Pew Report and
20   other documents and reports related to the regulation of health
21   professionals, and prepare a report containing its findings and
22   recommendations, including any proposed legislation; and
23   
24        BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Director of Commerce and
25   Consumer Affairs is requested to serve as Chair of the Task
26   Force and appoint members of the task force to include
27   appropriate representation of consumers, providers, health care
28   institutions such as hospitals and health plans, health care
29   professional associations, educational institutions, business,
30   and government; and
31   
32        BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Task Force is requested to
33   submit its findings, report, and recommendations twenty days
34   before the convening of the Regular Session of 2001; and
35   
36        BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this
37   Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the Director of
38   Commerce and Consumer Affairs, the Director of Health, and the
39   Chairs of all the regulatory boards of the health professions
40   in the State of Hawaii.