New Kansas Law Erases 20 Years of Nurse Discipline

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly (D) has signed new legislation that voids more than 20 years’ worth of nursing board disciplinary actions, and overhauls the current nursing board.

All board seats must be vacated by July 1, according to the now finalized HB 2528, which moved very quickly through both houses of the state legislature after it was introduced in January.

The new law also sets up a pathway and fees for late license renewal, with a grace period of 30 days, and requires that all future board members be subject to state senate confirmation. In addition, it limits the “unprofessional conduct” sanction to practice-related acts.

Amy Siple, NP, who has been a leading voice in getting the legislation passed, said the policies pertaining to overhauling the board were added by the legislature.

“I’ve worked on legislation before and what’s passed is usually watered down,” Siple told MedPage Today. “But with ours, stuff kept getting added. The legislature felt we didn’t go far enough. They were angry when they discovered the way nurses had been treated.”

Siple’s initial focus was on erasing discipline for nonpractice-related issues, such as late license renewal. She was driven by her own experience of being sanctioned with “unprofessional conduct” for renewing her license late just one time.

Now, all nonpractice-related disciplinary actions as of January 2005 must be voided, per the new law. The board will have until Sept. 1 to do so, according to state Sen. Pat Pettey (D), who voted against the legislation.

Pettey said about 750 such cases will have to be adjudicated, which may be difficult if the board — which must regulate 71,000 nurses — is in a state of upheaval.

“To me, the bill is an overreach, reacting to a minority of people who said they had issues, without any confirmation” of those issues, Pettey told MedPage Today.

She added that the bill’s fast push through the legislature was atypical. “You generally don’t see these things on a fast track,” she said.

As for the board overhaul, all seats must be vacated by July 1, when the governor will appoint a new interim board. A full board must be appointed by the governor by the beginning of next year, and all of those positions will have to be confirmed by the state senate.

Pettey added that the board’s current executive director, along with six other board members, have already resigned.

Other elements in the new law include a prohibition on retaliation against nurses by the board, and a requirement that the board issue refunds for overpayment or duplicate payments.

The Kansas State Board of Nursing (KSBN) did not return a request for comment from MedPage Today; nor did the National Council of State Boards of Nursing.

However, during a hearing on the bill held by the state’s House Committee on Health and Human Services in February, KSBN Executive Administrator Carol Moreland, MSN, RN, raised concerns about “some of the cases that would be voided under this bill.”

“One of them was a school nurse who was sexually inappropriate with students, one nurse stole credit cards and made purchases after a patient was deceased,” Moreland said at the time. “Those are things that could be voided, and they would go off the record.”

Pettey said she was also concerned about patient safety given the changes. “We may not see the result of this next year,” she told MedPage Today. “It may take time to see if it has a negative impact.”

Judy Davidson, DNP, RN, of the Ohio State University in Columbus, who has long studied nurse suicide, was in favor of the new law. She said it has the potential to reduce nurse suicide because it “addresses unjust stressors and the financial consequences that arise when individuals are publicly classified under ‘misconduct,’ which can limit employment opportunities and damage professional standing.”

“By limiting ‘unprofessional conduct’ to practice-related issues, this bill could represent an important step toward reducing these harms and creating a more equitable regulatory framework,” Davidson added.

Siple began telling her story last summer, and once she did, the floodgates opened, she said. Many other nurses had similar stories of being disciplined for license renewal issues, and they shared those stories at two hearings convened by the state’s House Select Committee on Government Oversight this summer — one in July, one in September.

Siple’s license has been reinstated, but she is still fighting to have the “unprofessional conduct” blemish removed from her record.

“I hope it encourages nurses from other states to stand up,” she said.