Changes proposed in SF 825 to the regulation of supplemental nursing services agencies:
- Expands the list of types of temporary employees placed by “supplemental nursing services agency” to include any licensed health professional.
- Requires annual unannounced inspections of supplemental nursing services agencies to ensure compliance with the sections of statute regulating supplemental nursing services agencies.
- Requires supplemental nursing agencies to register annually with DHS and requires DHS to deposit registration fees in the special revenue fund.
- Requires registration applications to include a policy for making a supplemental nursing services agency’s records immediately available at all times to DHS and increases an annual registration fee from $891
to $2,035. If the agency fails to provide all the required parts of the registration application, DHS must refuse to issue the registration, subject to an appeals process.
- Adds a requirement that supplemental nursing services agencies retain for five years all records pertaining to their registration, including those records related to an agency’s insurance and bonding and its
employees’ education, training, and licensing. Agencies must make these documents immediately available to DHS. Subdivision 1 also adds a requirement that in order to retain their registration, agencies provide services to a health care facility during the
year prior to the date of their registration renewal.
- Removes the requirement that an agency must engage in a pattern of failure to comply with the provision of the section before it is subject to revocation or nonrenewal of its registration; a single instance
of failure to comply is sufficient.
- Requires a hearing involving an administrative law judge prior to the revocation or rejection of an agency’s registration or renewal of registration.
- Requires the Office of Health Facility Complaints to investigate complaints against supplemental nursing services agencies.
Kathy Messerli