I
107TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION
H. R. 1787
To amend the Indian Health Care Improvement Act to require that certain
technical medical employees of the Indian Health Service be compensated
for time during which they are required to be on-call.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
MAY 9, 2001
Mr. PETERSON of Minnesota introduced the following bill; which was referred
to the Committee on Resources, and in addition to the Committee on En-
ergy and Commerce, for a period to be subsequently determined by the
Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within
the jurisdiction of the committee concerned
A BILL
To amend the Indian Health Care Improvement Act to re-
quire that certain technical medical employees of the
Indian Health Service be compensated for time during
which they are required to be on-call.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. ON-CALL PAY FOR CERTAIN TECHNICAL MED-
ICAL EMPLOYEES.
Title I of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act
(25 U.S.C. 1611 et seq.) is amended by adding at the end
the following new section:
‘‘SEC. 125. ON-CALL PAY FOR CERTAIN TECHNICAL MED-
ICAL EMPLOYEES.
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary shall pay a tech-
nical medical employee of the Service for such time as the
technical medical employee is officially scheduled to be on
call outside such technical medical employee’s regular
hours or on a holiday designated by Federal statute or
Executive order for such time as the technical medical em-
ployee may be called back to work at a rate that is equal
to 10 percent of the amount that is equal to one and 1⁄2
times such technical medical employee’s hourly rate of
basic pay.
‘‘(b) TECHNICAL MEDICAL EMPLOYEE.—For the
purposes of this section, the term ‘technical medical em-
ployee’ includes the following:
‘‘(1) MEDICAL
TECHNICIAN.—An employee
whose position is in the GS-0645 occupational series.
Such a position may involve nonprofessional tech-
nical work in clinical (medical) laboratories such as
performing tests and examinations in one or more
areas of work (such as chemistry, blood banking, he-
matology, or microbiology) where the reports of find-
ings of tests and examinations may be used by phy-
sicians in diagnosis, care and treatment of patients,
or in support of medical research. The work may re-
quire a practical knowledge of the techniques of
medical laboratory practice in one or more areas of
clinical laboratory work (e.g., blood banking, chem-
istry, hematology, microbiology, and cytology) and of
the chemistry, biology, and anatomy involved.
‘‘(2) MEDICAL
TECHNOLOGIST.—An employee
whose position is in the GS-0644 occupational series.
Such a position may involve one or more of the fol-
lowing:
‘‘(A) Technical work subordinate to the
work of pathologists or other physicians (or
other professional employee) who make the final
diagnostic examinations of specimens of human
tissues or cell preparations).
‘‘(B) Technician work in histopathology in-
volving preparation of thin sections of tissue
specimens including fixing, clear, infiltrating,
embedding, sectioning, staining, and mounting.
‘‘(C) Technician work in cytology involving
preparation, staining, and examining micro-
scopically specimens of body fluids, secretions,
and exudiations from any part of the body to
determine whether cellar structure is normal,
atypical, or abnormal.
‘‘(D) Work requiring a practical knowledge
of the techniques of anatomical laboratory prac-
tice in one or both of the areas of laboratory
work (i.e. histopathology and cytology) and of
the chemistry, biology, and anatomy involved.
‘‘(3) DIAGNOSTIC RADIOLOGIC TECHNOLOGIST
OR TECHNICIAN.—An employee whose position is in
the GS-0647 occupational series. Such a position
may involve one or more of the following:
‘‘(A) Performing most routine diagnostic
radiographic procedures under general super-
vision and gains experience in the performance
of more difficult techniques and procedures by
assisting higher grade technologists.
‘‘(B) Operating radiographic equipment to
produce x-ray films of chest, joints, feet, hands,
long bones of arms and legs, and other routine
views of other parts of the body.
‘‘(C) Working with outpatients or ambula-
tory patients, positions patients, and sets tech-
nical factors in accordance with standardized
procedures and techniques.
‘‘(D) Performing a variety of difficult radi-
ographic examinations.
‘‘(E) Receiving patients, explaining method
of procedure, positions patient, selecting and
setting technical factors, setting up and adjust-
ing accessory equipment required, and making
exposures necessary for the requested proce-
dure.
‘‘(c) MODIFICATIONS.—The Secretary shall carry out
the intent of this section so that it applies to—
‘‘(1) subsequent or additional occupational se-
ries designations or redesignations; and
‘‘(2) modified or additional employee descrip-
tions as such modifications or additions are nec-
essary to correspond with technological advance-
ments.
‘‘(d) EXCEPTION FOR RATE OF ON-CALL PAY.—An
employee who is eligible for on-call pay under subsection
(a) and who was receiving standby premium pay pursuant
to section 5545 of title 5 on May 20, 1988, shall, as long
as such employee is employed in the same position and
work unit and remains eligible for such standby pay, re-
ceive pay for any period of on-call duty at the rate equal
to the greater of—
‘‘(1) the rate of pay which such employee would
receive if being paid the rate of standby pay pursu-
ant to such section that such individual would be en-
titled to receive if such individual were not scheduled
to be on call instead, or
‘‘(2) the rate of pay which such employee is en-
titled to receive including on-call premium pay de-
scribed in subsection (a).’’.
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