California Sends Multiple Bills Impacting Oral Health Professionals to Governor

The California Legislature entered an interim recess last week and is unlikely to meet again before 2022. Before wrapping up business for the year, legislators sent multiple bills to Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) that could impact oral health professionals. Summaries of those bills are below:

• AB 107 expands a requirement to issue temporary licenses by credentials to spouses and domestic partners of active-duty members of the military who are assigned to a duty station in California under official active-duty military orders. Current law places this requirement on some boards that are under the jurisdiction of the state’s Department of Consumer Affairs. This bill would expand this requirement to all boards under the jurisdiction of the Department, including the Dental Board of California.
• AB 526 authorizes a dentist or podiatrist, if the dentist or podiatrist complies with specified requirements, to independently prescribe and administer for persons three years of age or older influenza and COVID-19 vaccines approved or authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The bill also expands the definition of “laboratory director” to include a duly licensed dentist serving as the director of a laboratory that performs only authorized clinical laboratory tests.
• AB 615 requires a higher education employer to provide a procedure for all medical and dental interns and residents to challenge a termination of employment or a disciplinary action after the employee has exhausted available administrative or academic grievance processes, as provided. The bill would not apply to a termination of employment or disciplinary action based on certain academic or clinical matters. A similar bill passed the legislature in 2020, but it was vetoed by the Governor.
• SB 242 requires health insurers and health care service plans, including plans that offer a contract covering dental services, to reimburse contracting health care providers for business expenses undertaken to prevent the spread of respiratory-transmitted infectious diseases causing public health emergencies that were declared on or after Jan. 1, 2022. “Business expenses” are defined as personal protective equipment, additional supplies, materials and clinical staff time over and above those expenses usually included in an office visit or other non-facility service or services.
• SB 365 makes electronic consultation services reimbursable under the Medi-Cal program for enrolled providers, including federally qualified health centers or rural health clinics. The bill sets the condition of its implementation on the reimbursement of the state’s Department of Health Care Services obtaining necessary approval of federal matching funds.
• SB 534 makes numerous changes to provisions of law that govern mobile dental hygiene clinics and special teaching permits for dental hygienists licensed in other states. An extensive summary of this bill was provided in the May 18 edition of the ADEA Advocate. The May 18 summary includes a description of provisions that would have created changes to the membership of the dental hygiene board, which were struck from the final version of the bill.
• CA SB 607 made several changes to licensing laws in the state. The changes include the following:
• The bill deletes provisions of the current law that required registered expanded functions dental assistants to pass a clinical or practical examination requirement for licensure.
• It limits the application fee for a pediatric minimal sedation permit to $1,000 and the renewal fee to $600.
• The bill clarifies that a foreign dental school whose program approval was renewed by the Dental Board of California prior to Jan. 1, 2020, through any date between Jan. 1, 2024, and June 30, 2026, will maintain approval through that date. Upon expiration of the approval, the foreign dental school will be required to comply with legislation that was passed in 2019, which requires foreign dental schools to complete the international consultative and accreditation process with the Commission on Dental Accreditation or a comparable accrediting body approved by the Board.
• It extends the repeal date of the Dental Hygiene Board of California and related appointment provisions from Jan. 1, 2023, to Jan. 1, 2024.
• SB 682 establishes the End Racial Inequities in Children’s Health in California Initiative (EnRICH CA Initiative). The bill requires the California Health and Human Services Agency, in collaboration with other specified groups, to convene an advisory workgroup to develop and implement a plan that establishes targets to reduce racial disparities in health outcomes by at least 50% by Dec. 31, 2030, in chronic conditions affecting children. These chronic conditions include but are not limited to asthma, diabetes, dental caries, depression and vaping-related diseases. The agency would be required to submit the plan for the EnRICH CA Initiative to the legislature and post the plan online by Jan. 1, 2023, and to commence implementation of the plan no later than June 30, 2023.