Travel Nursing Agency Transparency Study Act
Bill: S.4352 | Sponsor: Sen. Cramer, Kevin (R-ND)
Policy area: Health

Summary:
Travel Nursing Agency Transparency Study Act
This bill requires the Government Accountability Office to study the effects of travel nurse agencies during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study must consider matters that include agency business and payment practices, the effects of travel nurse agency practices on workforce shortages, and the acquisition of travel nurse agencies by private equity firms.

To require a study on the effects of travel nurse agencies on the 
             health industry during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Travel Nursing Agency Transparency 
Study Act''.

SEC. 2. GAO STUDY ON TRAVEL NURSE AGENCIES.

    The Comptroller General of the United States shall--
            (1) conduct a study on the effects of travel nurse agencies 
        on the health care industry during the COVID-19 pandemic, which 
        shall include consideration of--
                    (A) the business practices and payment practices of 
                such agencies, including any potential price gouging 
                and taking of excessive profits;
                    (B) the difference between how much such agencies 
                charged health care institutions and how much they paid 
                their contracted nurses;
                    (C) the extent to which such agencies could provide 
                more transparency regarding the payments received from 
                health care institutions, and the payments made by the 
                agencies to the nurses who are contracted by such 
                agencies;
                    (D) the specific ways in which rural areas of the 
                United States were affected by the rise of travel 
                nursing across the country, and subsequent workforce 
                shortage disparities;
                    (E) how States that imposed caps to travel nurse 
                pay were affected by the market reaction to such caps;
                    (F) how Federal funds, including the Provider 
                Relief Fund and any assistance granted to a health care 
                institution under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster 
                Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5 121 et 
                seq.), were used by health care institutions to pay 
                such agencies throughout the workforce shortages 
                exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic;
                    (G) the extent to which travel nurse agency 
                practices contribute to workforce shortages; and
                    (H) the extent to which travel nurse agencies have 
                been acquired by private equity firms and the impact of 
                such acquisitions on the profits of the agencies; and
            (2) not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of 
        this Act, submit a report to Congress on such study.
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