SENATE BILL 441

49th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - first session, 2009

INTRODUCED BY

Sue Wilson Beffort

AN ACT

RELIEVING A VETERAN OF THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES FROM THE REQUIREMENT TO PAY A FEE TO THE NEW MEXICO MEDICAL BOARD FOR AN INITIAL LICENSE TO PRACTICE MEDICINE IN NEW MEXICO.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO:

     Section 1. [NEW MATERIAL] INITIAL LICENSE FEE WAIVED.--A physician who is a veteran of the United States armed forces is exempt from the payment of a license fee for the physician's initial license.

     Section 2. Section 61-6-6 NMSA 1978 (being Laws 1973, Chapter 361, Section 1, as amended) is amended to read:

     "61-6-6. DEFINITIONS.--As used in Chapter 61, Article 6 NMSA 1978:

          A. "approved postgraduate training program" means a program approved by the [accrediting] accreditation council [on] for graduate medical education of the American medical association or by the board;

          B. "board" means the New Mexico medical board;

          C. "licensed physician" means a medical doctor licensed under the Medical Practice Act to practice medicine in New Mexico;

          D. "licensee" means a medical doctor, physician assistant, polysomnographic technologist or anesthesiologist assistant licensed by the board to practice in New Mexico;

          E. "medical college or school in good standing" means a board-approved medical college or school that has as high a standard as that required by the association of American medical colleges and the council on medical education of the American medical association;

          F. "medical student" means a student enrolled in a board-approved medical college or school in good standing;

          G. "physician assistant" means a health professional who is licensed by the board to practice as a physician assistant and who provides services to patients under the supervision and direction of a licensed physician;

          H. "intern" means a first-year postgraduate student upon whom a degree of doctor of medicine and surgery or equivalent degree has been conferred by a medical college or school in good standing;

          I. "resident" means a graduate of a medical college or school in good standing who is in training in a board-approved and accredited residency training program in a hospital or facility affiliated with an approved hospital and who has been appointed to the position of "resident" or "fellow" for the purpose of postgraduate medical training;

          J. "the practice of medicine" consists of:

                (1) advertising, holding out to the public or representing in any manner that one is authorized to practice medicine in this state;

                (2) offering or undertaking to administer, dispense or prescribe a drug or medicine for the use of another person, except as authorized pursuant to a professional or occupational licensing statute set forth in Chapter 61 NMSA 1978;

                (3) offering or undertaking to give or administer, dispense or prescribe a drug or medicine for the use of another person, except as directed by a licensed physician;

                (4) offering or undertaking to perform an operation or procedure upon a person;

                (5) offering or undertaking to diagnose, correct or treat in any manner or by any means, methods, devices or instrumentalities any disease, illness, pain, wound, fracture, infirmity, deformity, defect or abnormal physical or mental condition of a person;

                (6) offering medical peer review, utilization review or diagnostic service of any kind that directly influences patient care, except as authorized pursuant to a professional or occupational licensing statute set forth in Chapter 61 NMSA 1978; or

                (7) acting as the representative or agent of a person in doing any of the things listed in this subsection;

          K. "the practice of medicine across state lines" means:

                (1) the rendering of a written or otherwise documented medical opinion concerning diagnosis or treatment of a patient within this state by a physician located outside this state as a result of transmission of individual patient data by electronic, telephonic or other means from within this state to the physician or the physician's agent; or

                (2) the rendering of treatment to a patient within this state by a physician located outside this state as a result of transmission of individual patient data by electronic, telephonic or other means from within this state to the physician or the physician's agent;

          L. "sexual contact" means touching the primary genital area, groin, anus, buttocks or breast of a patient or allowing a patient to touch another's primary genital area, groin, anus, buttocks or breast in a manner that is commonly recognized as outside the scope of acceptable medical practice;

          M. "sexual penetration" means sexual intercourse, cunnilingus, fellatio or anal intercourse, whether or not there is any emission, or introducing any object into the genital or anal openings of another in a manner that is commonly recognized as outside the scope of acceptable medical practice; [and]

          N. "United States" means the fifty states, its territories and possessions and the District of Columbia; and

          O. "veteran" means a person who has been honorably discharged from a branch of the armed forces of the United States."

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