2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE TWENTY - Examining Boards and Professional Colleges (§§ 1 — 6033) › Chapter 6 - Medical Discipline and Licensure Board Act (§§ 131 — 135j) › Subchapter II - Medical Discipline and Licensure Board (§§ 132 — 132k) › § 132d - Authority

(1) The Board shall be in charge of authorizing, within the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the practice of the profession of physician and osteopath. The Board shall also authorize the practice of acupuncture for physicians legally admitted into the practice of the profession in Puerto Rico who present their credentials before the Medical Discipline and Licensure Board, which, by regulation to that effect, shall determine the training and experience required to authorize said practice in Puerto Rico. Such evidence shall be recorded on the books of the Board and a copy thereof shall be filed with the applicant’s record. The penalties established in this chapter shall apply to persons convicted of illegally practicing acupuncture.
(2) The Board shall have the power to deny, suspend, cancel or revoke any license and to issue an order fixing a probation period on a physician for a specific term, as established below in this chapter.
(3) The Board shall provide in its regulations for the development of a sound and comprehensive orientation program addressed to persons who wish to pursue studies in medicine, in terms of, among others:
(a) The needs of physicians in Puerto Rico;
(b) the requirements established by law to take the physician licensure examination;
(c) obtaining a permanent license in Puerto Rico, and
(d) schools of medicine that are recognized or accredited in the United States of America, Canada, and other foreign countries where they could pursue studies in medicine and subsequently apply for a licensure examination and a license in Puerto Rico, whose programs are of an equal or a superior quality and competence, but never under the criteria of the schools of medicine of Puerto Rico that are accredited by the Council on Higher Education of Puerto Rico.
(4) The Board shall develop an information system that allows for the establishment of statistic relations between the licensure examination results and the characteristics of examinees. The Board shall also establish a register that contains basic data about licensure examinees, such as:
(a) Age;
(b) sex;
(c) school of origin, and
(d) grade point average upon admission into the school of medicine.
(5) The Board shall develop a register that contains all decisions issued by Resolution by the entity.
(6) The Board shall hire or contract one or more recognized organizations or agencies to prepare, provide, administer and evaluate an examination that is appropriate for the evaluation required. The Board shall establish the date, time, place, method, manner, scope and subjects to be examined.
(7) The Board may require that licensees provide information relative to their possible deficiencies as to the practice, professional performance, or their qualifications.
These reports shall include but shall not be limited to the areas comprised within this chapter.
(8) The Board shall conduct from time to time, within a period not to exceed three (3) years from one census to another, and with the collaboration of the Department of Health, a census of graduates of schools of medicine who have not passed the licensure examination. Such census shall include, without it being construed as a limitation, the name of the graduate, the name of the school of medicine he/she graduated from, the date of graduation, and, if working in the field of health, the name of the workplace and the functions he/she discharges. The Board shall prepare and promulgate, in consultation with the Secretary of Health, regulations establishing the norms and procedures to conduct the census provided in this section.
(9) The Board shall promulgate the regulations required in the above subsections within a term not to exceed one hundred and eighty (180) days as of the date of approval of this act.
History —Aug. 1, 2008, No. 139, § 7, eff. Jan 1, 2009.