Rhode Island Code of Regulations › Title 216 - Department of health › Chapter 40 - Professional licensing and facility regulation › Subchapter 05 - Professional Licensing › Part 1 - Licensure and Discipline of Physicians (216-RICR-40-05-1) › Section 216-RICR-40-05-1.2 - Definitions

Current through June 14, 2024
A. Wherever used in this Part, the terms
				  listed below shall be construed in the following manner:
1. "Acupuncture" means the insertion of
				  needles into the human body by piercing the skin of the body, for the purpose
				  of controlling and regulating the flow and balance of energy in the body. For
				  the purposes of this Part; "medical acupuncture" means acupuncture as practiced
				  by physicians licensed under the provisions of R.I. Gen. Laws Chapter
				  5-37.
2. "Act" means R.I. Gen. Laws
				  Chapter 5-37 entitled "Board of Medical Licensure and Discipline."
3. "Board" means the Rhode Island Board of
				  Medical Licensure and Discipline or any committee or subcommittee thereof
				  established under the provisions of R.I. Gen. Laws §
											5-37-1.1.
4. "Chief administrative officer" means the
				  administrator of the Rhode Island Board of Medical Licensure and
				  Discipline.
5. "Collaborative
				  pharmacy practice" means that practice of pharmacy whereby a pharmacist with
				  advanced training and experience relevant to the scope of collaborative
				  practice agrees to work in collaboration with one (1) or more physicians for
				  the purpose of drug therapy management of patients, such management to be
				  pursuant to a protocol or protocols authorized by the physician(s) and subject
				  to approval by the Department and any conditions and/or limitations thereto. A
				  health care professional who has prescribing privileges and is employed by a
				  collaborating physician may be in such an agreement.
6. "Compounding" means the act of combining
				  two (2) or more ingredients as a result of a practitioners prescription or
				  medication order occurring in the course of professional practice based upon
				  the individual needs of a patient and a relationship between the practitioner,
				  patient and pharmacists. Compounding does not mean the routine preparation,
				  mixing, reconstitution or assembling od drug products that are essentially
				  copies of a commercially available product. Pharmacy compounding includes the
				  preparation of drugs or devices pursuant to a prescription or medication order
				  or in anticipation or prescription or medication orders based upon routine,
				  regularly observed prescribing patterns.
7. "Compounding sterile preparations" or
				  "CSPs" means a sterile drug or nutrient compounded in a licensed pharmacy or
				  other healthcare-related facility pursuant to the order of a licensed
				  prescriber; the article may or may not contain sterile products.
8. "Department" means the Rhode Island
				  Department of Health.
9. "Director"
				  means the Director, Rhode Island Department of Health.
10. "Doctor of acupuncture" means a person
				  who has been licensed under the provisions of R.I. Gen. Laws Chapter 5-37.2 to
				  practice the art of healing known as acupuncture.
11. "Drug therapy management" means the
				  review, in accordance with a collaborative practice agreement, of drug therapy
				  regimen(s) of patients by a pharmacist for the purpose of rendering advice to
				  one (1) or more physicians that are party to the agreement, or their physician
				  designees, regarding adjustment of the regimen. Decisions involving drug
				  therapy management shall be made in the best interests of the patient. In
				  accordance with a collaborative practice agreement, drug therapy management may
				  include:
a. Modifying and managing drug
				  therapy;
b. Collecting and
				  reviewing patient histories;
c.
				  Obtaining and checking vital signs, including pulse, temperature, blood
				  pressure, and respiration; and
d.
				  Under the supervision of, or in direct consultation with a physician, ordering
				  and evaluating the results of laboratory tests directly related to drug therapy
				  when performed in accordance with approved protocols applicable to the practice
				  setting and providing such evaluation does not include any diagnostic
				  component.
12. "Foreign
				  medical graduate" means a physician (individual) whose basic medical degree or
				  qualification was conferred by an allopathic medical school located outside the
				  United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
13. "Good standing" means a licensee has an
				  unrestricted license to practice medicine.
14. "Intern, resident, or fellow" means a
				  physician in training in an accredited postgraduate training program.
15. "License" is synonymous with registration
				  certificate.
16. "Medical
				  malpractice" or "malpractice" means any tort, or breach of contract based on
				  health care or professional services rendered, or which should have been
				  rendered, by a physician, dentist, hospital, clinic, health maintenance
				  organization or professional service corporation providing health care services
				  and organized under R.I. Gen. Laws Chapter 7-5.1, to a patient or the rendering
				  of medically unnecessary services except at the informed request of the
				  patient.
17. "Medical record" means
				  a record of a patient's medical information and treatment history maintained by
				  physicians and other medical personnel, which includes, but is not limited to,
				  information related to medical diagnosis, immunizations, allergies, x-rays,
				  copies of laboratory reports, records of prescriptions, and other technical
				  information used in assessing the patient's health condition, whether such
				  information is maintained in a paper or electronic format.
18. "Non-ablative treatment" means any
				  laser/intense pulsed light treatment or other energy source, chemical, or
				  modality that is not expected or intended to remove, burn, or vaporize tissue.
				  This shall include treatments related to laser hair removal.
19. "Person" means any individual,
				  partnership, firm corporation, (including, but not limited to, associations,
				  joint stock companies, limited liability companies, and insurance companies),
				  trust or estate, state or political subdivision or instrumentality of a
				  State.
20. "Physician" means any
				  person licensed to practice allopathic or osteopathic medicine pursuant to the
				  provisions of R.I. Gen. Laws Chapter 5-37.
21. "Postgraduate training" means
				  satisfactory training after earning the medical degree at an accredited
				  program, or its equivalent as determined by the Board, including internship,
				  residency and fellowship. Such training shall include one (1) year of
				  internship and one (1) or two (2) years of progressive residency or comparable
				  fellowship.
22. "Practice of
				  medicine" means the practice of allopathic and osteopathic medicine. Any person
				  shall be regarded as practicing medicine within the meaning of the Act who
				  holds himself or herself out as being able to diagnose, treat, perform surgery,
				  use a laser/intense pulsed light, or prescribe for any person for disease,
				  pain, injury, deformity or physical or mental condition or prescribe for any
				  person ill or alleged to be ill with disease, pain, injury, deformity or
				  abnormal physical or mental condition, or who shall either profess to heal,
				  offer or undertake, by any means or method, to diagnose, treat, perform
				  surgery, or prescribe for any person for disease, pain, injury, deformity or
				  physical or mental condition. In addition, one who attaches the title M.D.,
				  physician, surgeon, D.O., osteopathic physician and surgeon, or any other
				  similar word or words or abbreviation to his or her name indicating that he or
				  she is engaged in the treatment or diagnosis of the diseases, injuries or
				  conditions of persons shall be held to be engaged in the practice of medicine.
				  Non-ablative treatment is part of the practice of medicine.
23. "Prescriber" means a health care provider
				  who is licensed in the State of Rhode Island who has prescribing
				  privileges.
24. "Surgery" is
				  performed for the purpose of structurally altering the human body by the
				  incision or destruction of tissues and is part of the practice of medicine.
				  Surgery also is the diagnostic or therapeutic treatment of conditions or
				  disease processes by any instruments causing localized alteration or
				  transposition of human tissue which include lasers, ultrasound, ionizing
				  radiation, scalpels, probes, and needles. The tissue can be cut, burned,
				  vaporized, frozen, sutured, probed, or manipulated by closed reductions for
				  major dislocations or fractures, or otherwise altered by mechanical, thermal,
				  light-based, electromagnetic, or chemical means. All of these surgical
				  procedures are invasive, including those that are performed with lasers, and
				  the risks of any surgical procedure are not eliminated by using a light knife
				  or laser in place of a metal knife, or scalpel.
25. "Telemedicine" means, as defined in R.I.
				  Gen. Laws §
											27-81-3, the delivery of clinical
				  healthcare services by use of real time, two (2) way synchronous audio, video,
				  telephone-audio-only communications or electronic media or other
				  telecommunications technology including but not limited to: online adaptive
				  interviews, remote patient monitoring devises, audiovisual communications,
				  including the application of secure video conferencing or store-and-forward
				  technology to provide or support healthcare deliver, which facilitate the
				  assessment, diagnosis, counseling an prescribing treatment and care management
				  of a patient's healthcare while such patient is at an originating site and the
				  healthcare provider is at a distant site, consistent with applicable Federal
				  laws and Regulation. Telemedicine does not include an email message or
				  facsimile transmission between the provider and patient, or an automated
				  computer program used to diagnose and/or treat ocular or refractive
				  conditions.