Professional Licensure

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Professional Licensure
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Professional Licensing

• What function does licensing serves?
• Status
• Market exclusion
• State sanctioned monopolies
• Quality control
• Protection of public health
• Increase cost of entry

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Physician Licensure

• MD
• DO
• Board Certification, not required
• Distinguish from credentialing

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State v. Miller

• What are the facts of this case?
• Charged with practicing medicine without a
  license
• Defendant claims he never held himself out as a
  doctor
• He did, however, let customers believe he could
  diagnose and cure ailments
• Routinely prescribed and furnished medicines

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Unlicensed Practice of Medicine

• Criminal
• Defining Medical Practice
• If you tell me you have a headache and I tell you
  to take 2 aspirins, am I engaged in the
  unauthorized practice of medicine?
• Is their a constitutional right to provide care?
• Are patients constitutionally permitted to
  obtain medical care from anyone, even
  non-licensed persons?

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Other Health Care Professionals

• Midwifery
• Nurses
• Physician Assistants
• Telemedicine

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Modi v. West Virginia Board of Medicine

• What are the facts of this case?
• What issues are raised by the doctor in this
  appeal of the Boards action?
• What does the court hold?

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Problem, Page 954