This year's bill that would remove the joint Board's authority to regulate APRNs, SB 1105, was "passed by indefinitely" (PBI) in the Senate Education and Health Committee on January 19th. PBI means that the bill will not be reported out of the Senate; in other words, it is done. In the discussion on this bill, the Education and Health subcommittee recommended that the chairman of the committee, Sen. Louise Lucas, write a letter to the Department of Health Professions to constitute a workgroup to study several things, including:  

• Reconstitution of the APRNs on the Board of Nursing. Currently, only two slots are reserved for APRNs, and there are four types of APRNs. So should there be more APRNs on thBoardrd? And if so, how many and what types?
• Should there be an APRN advisory board to the Board of Nursing? What would the membership look like? How would "medicine" be involved, if at all, in regulating APRN practice? 

When we get a copy, we will post that. But for now, there will continue to be joint board regulation of APRN practice.  This gives us another opportunity next year to revisit this bill.  The DHP has historically supported APRNs and our agenda to gain full practice authority.  

Our second bill,  SB 975, will change the nomenclature that refers to APRNs as nurse practitioners to Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRN). This is a technical bill. All sections of the Code of Virginia that currently names "nurse practitioners" will be amended to "advanced practice registered nurse," and/or the exact type of APRN. This bill was voted out of the Senate Education and Health committee on January 19th in a supportive unanimous vote of 14-0. It will go to the full Senate for consideration, perhaps beginning on January 20th. It will need to be read on three consecutive days before the final Senate vote is taken, we expect this to happen January 25th. Its next step after that will be to go to the House of Delegates for consideration. The earliest that can occur is February 8th

Visit https://lis.virginia.gov/  to keep up with the progress of SB 975.