BILL NUMBER: S4043
SPONSOR: RIVERA
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the education law, in relation to including nurse prac-
titioners as a provider of services for purposes of collaborative drug
therapy management; and to amend chapter 21 of the laws of 2011 amending
the education law relating to authorizing pharmacists to perform colla-
borative drug therapy management with physicians in certain settings, in
relation to making the authorization for pharmacists to perform collabo-
rative drug therapy management permanent
 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
To extend and expand provisions enacted in 2011 that permit pharmacists
to collaborate with physicians in the provision of collaborative drug
therapy to include nurse practitioners.
 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
Section 1 of the bill would amend section 6801-a of the Education Law as
follows by adding nurse practitioners (NPs) to the legislation to allow
NPs to enter into collaborative agreements with pharmacists by which
drug therapies would be reviewed, evaluated, and managed; and authorizes
Collaborative Drug Therapy Management (CDTM) to occur in all hospitals
and other Article 28 facilities, such as nursing homes and clinics; and
permits the State Education Department in consultation with the Depart-
ment of Health, to include up to fifteen community practice sites as
authorized locations for the provision of CDTM.
Section 2 of the bill would repeal the expiration date of the prior
statute and make the provisions permanent.
 
JUSTIFICATION:
Legislation was enacted in 2011 to establish the Collaborative Drug
Therapy Management (CDTM) Demonstration Program, by which pharmacists,
working in collaborative agreements with physicians, could adjust,
manage, evaluate, and implement drug therapies for patients in certain
settings. The current law only applies to teaching hospitals and their
affiliated outpatient and freestanding clinics.
This bill would extend the current program to all Article 28 licensed
healthcare facilities (hospitals, clinics, and residential healthcare
facilities) and permit the practice on a more limited basis in certain
community-based settings. The bill would also permit nurse practitioners
to engage in collaborative agreements with pharmacists. Adverse drug
reactions or adverse drug events (ADRs or ADEs) are reported to be among
the leading causes of death in the United States, behind only heart
disease, cancer, and stroke. The most updated financial information on
ADRs suggests that these earlier estimates may understate the problem. A
recent comprehensive study of medication errors estimated that as many
as 2.7 million errors occur each year in hospitals in the United States,
adversely affecting 130,000 patients. Studies have shown that at least
28% of these errors were preventable. Nearly half of the errors made
resulted from errors in the prescribing process. These medication errors
are potentially dangerous to patients and extremely costly to the
healthcare system, resulting in additional and unnecessary expenditures
of as much as $177 billion per year. Of this amount, seventy percent was
attributed to unnecessary hospital admissions or prolonged hospital
stays due to medication errors. Virtually every other state permits
CDTM, most of which authorize the practice in many more settings than
permitted under the current New York State law. The results have been
uniformly positive: CDTM, along with pharmacist-provided drug informa-
tion services, adverse drug reaction monitoring, drug protocol manage-
ment, and medial rounds participation by pharmacists, have all shown to
make a statistically significant contribution to the reduction of medi-
cation errors. The expansion of the statute to additional settings and
the authorizing of Nurse Practitioners as collaborating practitioners is
warranted not only by the success of the New York State initiative but
also based on other states' records.
 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
2021-2022: New Bill / A1036
2019-2020: A3048 Seawright
2017-2018: S4296 Lavelle / A10196
2015-2016: S280 Lavalle
2021-2022: S4689 Rivera
 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS FOR STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS:
None.
 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect on the one hundred twentieth day after it
shall have become a law; provided that, effective immediately, the addi-
tion, amendment, and/or repeal of any rule or regulation necessary for
the implementation of this act on its effective date are authorized and
directed to be made and completed on or before such effective date.

Statutes affected:
S4043: 6801-a education law