Washington Administrative Code › Title 246 - Health, Department of › FACILITY STANDARDS AND LICENSING › Chapter 246-329 - Childbirth centers › Section 246-329-010 - Definitions

Current through Register Vol. 24-14, July 15, 2024
For purposes of this chapter, the following words and phrases
				  will have the following meanings unless the context clearly indicates
				  otherwise:
(1) "Administration of
				drugs" means an act in which a single dose of a prescribed drug or biological
				is given to a client by an authorized person in accordance with all laws and
				rules governing these acts. The complete act of administration entails removing
				an individual dose from a previously dispensed, properly labeled container,
				including a unit dose container, verifying it with the orders of a practitioner
				who is legally authorized to prescribe, giving the individual dose to the
				proper client and properly recording the time and dose given.
(2) "Applicant" means a person seeking
				licensure as a childbirth center under this chapter.
(3) "Authenticated or authentication" means
				authorization of a written entry in a record by means of a signature which
				shall include, minimally, first initial, last name, and title or unique
				identifier verifying accuracy of information.
(4) "Bathing facility" means a bathtub or
				shower.
(5) "Birthing center" or
				"childbirth center" or "birth center" means any health facility, not part of a
				hospital or in a hospital, that provides facilities and clinical staff to
				support a birth service to low risk maternity clients. This chapter does not
				apply to any hospital approved by the American College of Surgeons, American
				Osteopathic Association, or its successor.
(6) "Birthing room" means a room designed,
				equipped, and arranged to provide for the care of a woman and newborn and to
				accommodate her support person or persons during the process of vaginal
				childbirth, (the three stages of labor and recovery of a woman and
				newborn).
(7) "Birth service" means
				the prenatal, intrapartum, and postpartum care provided for low-risk maternity
				clients, including newborn care during transition and stabilization.
(8) "Client" means a woman, fetus, and
				newborn receiving care and services provided by a birth center during pregnancy
				and childbirth and recovery.
(9)
				"Clinical staff" means physicians and midwives, including contractors,
				appointed by the governing body to practice within the birth center and
				governed by rules and policies and procedures approved by the governing
				body.
(10) "Consultation" means the
				process used by the clinical staff of a childbirth center who maintain primary
				management responsibilities for the client's care to seek the opinion of a
				licensed physician on clinical issues that are client specific. The physician
				consulted must be qualified by training and experience in specific client need
				for which consultation is sought. Consultation, appropriate to client need,
				must be available during all times birth services are provided in a childbirth
				center.
(11) "Contractor" means an
				individual who has a written contract with a birth center licensee to provide
				birth services. The written contract must be approved by the governing body,
				including appointment of clinical privileges by the governing body. Birth
				services provided by contractors in licensed birth centers must meet
				requirements of this chapter, unless otherwise noted.
(12) "Department" means the Washington state
				department of health.
(13)
				"Emergency" means a medical emergency or injury requiring immediate medical or
				surgical intervention to prevent death or disability.
(14) "Emergency transfer" means the transfer
				of a maternal client or newborn in an emergent situation to a facility that can
				manage obstetrical and neonatal emergencies, including the ability to perform
				cesarean delivery.
(15) "Governing
				body" means the person or persons responsible for establishing and approving
				the purposes and policies and procedures of the childbirth center.
(16) "Hospital" means any institution, place,
				building, or agency which provides accommodations, facilities, and services
				over a continuous period of twenty-four hours or more, for observation,
				diagnosis, or care, of two or more individuals not related to the operator or
				suffering from any other condition which obstetrical, medical, or surgical
				services would be appropriate for care or diagnosis. "Hospital" as used in this
				definition includes facilities licensed under chapter 70.41 RCW. "Hospital" as
				used in this definition does not include:
(a)
				Hotels, or similar places furnishing only food and lodging, or simply,
				domiciliary care;
(b) Clinics or
				physicians' offices where patients are not regularly kept as bed patients for
				twenty-four hours or more;
(c)
				Nursing homes, defined and licensed under chapter 18.51 RCW;
(d) Childbirth centers licensed under this
				chapter and chapter 18.46 RCW;
(e)
				Psychiatric hospitals, licensed under chapter 71.12 RCW; or
(f) Any other hospital or institution
				specifically intended for use and the diagnosis and care of those suffering
				from mental illness, mental retardation, convulsive disorders, or other
				abnormal mental conditions. Nothing in this definition shall be construed as
				authorizing the supervision, regulation, or control of the remedial care or
				treatment of residents or patients in any hospital conducted for those who rely
				primarily upon treatment by prayer or spiritual means in accordance with creed
				or tenets of any well-recognized church or religious denomination.