BILL NUMBER: S9007
SPONSOR: COONEY
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the education law, in relation to a podiatry study
 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
An act to amend the education law, in relation to the study and evalu-
ation of the podiatric scope of practice changes enacted as part of
Chapter 438 of the Laws of 2012 and amended by Chapter 23 of the Laws of
2013
 
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:
§ 1. Requires Commissioner of Education, in consultation with the
Commissioner of Health, to study and issue a report on the implementa-
tion of Chapter 438 of the Laws of 2012, as amended by Chapter 23 of the
Laws of 2013, which authorized the issuance of a privilege to perform
podiatric standard or advanced ankle surgery. The study and report
shall evaluate the impact of granting such a privilege on access to and
quality of podiatric ankle surgery and outlines certain areas the report
and analysis must include.
§ 2. Requires Commissioner of Education to submit the report to the
Governor, Speaker of the Assembly, Temporary President of the Senate,
and chairs of the Senate and Assembly Higher Education Committees by
September 1, 2024, and biennially thereafter. The Education Department
is also required to report all data that are required to be included in
the report on its public website.
§ 3. Effective date
 
JUSTIFICATION:
The enactment of Chapter 438 of the laws of 2012 was the product of
years of negotiations between the impacted professions. The law author-
izes podiatrists who have completed a residency, obtained additional
practice and performed the requisite number of procedures to obtain
standard ankle surgery or advanced ankle surgery privilege. This
reflected the fact that the education and training of podiatrists was
not uniform making it imperative for patient safety and protection that
there be additional requirements to achieving such a privilege. Ever
since the enactment of the 2012 law, there have been continued attempts
to change the law under the premise of "technical changes," "technical
corrections," or "further refinement," but the latest changes proposed
in 2023 would completely undo the 2012 statutory amendment which was
supported by the professions.
To date, there is no publicly available information that reports on or
evaluates the impact of the 2012 statutory amendment on access to or
quality and safety of podiatric standard ankle surgery or podiatric
advanced ankle surgery. The public does not know how many podiatrists
have obtained the standard ankle surgery privilege or advanced ankle
surgery privilege, where those practitioners are located, how many such
procedures they have been performed, or the outcomes of those proce-
dures, including the number of adverse outcomes.
Before any further changes are considered to the 2012 law, it is imper-
ative the State Education Department undertake a thorough analysis and
issue a report evaluating the implementation of the law including how
many have obtained the privilege as well as quality and safety metrics
including but not limited to the number of reported adverse events
related to podiatric standard or podiatric advanced ankle surgery; and
the number of complaints filed with the Department against podiatrists
who have obtained a privilege for podiatric standard or podiatric
advanced ankle surgery that are related to the performance of such
surgery. Further, to the degree possible, the report shall describe how
the performance on quality and safety measures compare to performance in
states with laws similar to New York's to help assess whether New York's
experience is consistent with that of other states.
In 2023, Connecticut enacted a similar law requiring further study and
issuance of a report before considering any further changes to scope of
practice in this area. This bill requires New York to undertake its own
study to determine how the 2012 law impacted access, quality, and safe-
ty, so that the patient public, policy makers, and legislators can
engage in a thoughtful, informed dialogue of any possible additional
changes to podiatric scope of practice and privileges.
 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
New Bill.
 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
To be determined
 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
Immediately.

Statutes affected:
S9007: 7001 education law