CS/CS/HB 229 Summary - Impaired Practitioner Programs

• Revises Florida's impaired practitioner program by making consultant retention optional rather than mandatory and requiring terms be established by contract between the Department of Health and consultants.

• Allows impaired practitioners to be referred to private consultants rather than the Department of Health in certain circumstances, with protections for self-reporting participants who are compliant with treatment.

• Expands liability protections for consultants, their agents, and educational institutions when acting in good faith under the impaired practitioner program.

• Allows consultants to contract with medical schools and educational programs to provide services to students suspected of impairment and to withhold certain information about self-referring participants under specified conditions.

• Amends multiple health care licensing statutes (covering physicians, nurses, pharmacists, and other practitioners) to allow reporting of impaired professionals to consultants rather than directly to the Department of Health in appropriate situations.