Jamesville (WSYR-TV) - As health care reform opens medical options to more and more people, nurse practitioners are itching to step up to provide needed care.
In New York State, a nurse practitioner can diagnose, treat and prescribe under what's called a collaborative agreement. That means a physician must still supervise work and review records. NPs in a number of other states don't have that requirement and NPs in New York say it's a restriction that not only limits where they can practice, but also how many patients they can see.
That's why nurse practitioners like Jody Coppola and Bambi Carkey are pushing to eliminate the state requirement for collaboration.
"It will improve access to care to all Americans and I think that's where we need to start," Coppola said.
At Jamesville Family Medicine, nurse practitioners treat 2,500 patients and say they'd be able to treat even more if the restriction is lifted.
More nurse practitioner's would also be able to practice out of each location, Cuppola says. Under the current rule, a physician can only oversee a four nurse practitioners at a time. "So, you would have a clinic with multiple mid-level providers giving care to people and not have to worry about having that physician connected," she said.
Additionally, Coppola says it would give better coverage to rural areas, which have typically been tough logistically for physicians. "You certainly have to have a physician that's willing to do that," she said. "That's extra time and work for them as well."
Under the current rules, if a collaborating physician was ever incapacitated, an NP would have to stop practicing until another partner was lined up.
"That's problematic when you're trying to provide adequate care for your patients," said Carkey, a psychiatric nurse practitioner.
With more people lining up for care - and fewer family physicians coming out of the work to provide it - nurse practitioners say this is the step to get everyone covered.
Many physicians, meanwhile, are against the idea. Dr. Robert Draker with the Onondaga County Medical Society says he respects the work nurse practitioners do and the assistance they provide in coverage, but says the focus needs to be more on quality of care. He says NPs are not as extensively trained in the basic sciences and they do not have the minimum three-year post-graduate residency training needed to operate individually.
