A recap of the 2008 General Assembly.

As the 2008 Georgia General Assembly adjourned sine die on the 40th legislative day on Friday, April 4th, there were few issues of importance that were satisfactorily resolved. In the overall healthcare arena, the most important issues were trauma care funding and certificate of need reform. Fortunately these two issues were addressed.

Georgia's 15 designated trauma center hospitals will receive more than $60 million for the remainder of this fiscal year. However, no long term trauma care funding mechanism was approved by the House and Senate. Therefore this issue will be back next year as these critical providers continue to struggle to meet the needs of Georgia's 9.3 million citizens.

After four years of significant negotiation and compromise by all interested parties, the General Assembly approved reform to the certificate of need process. Senate Bill 433 includes such provisions as establishing general surgery as a single specialty; setting up a process for ambulatory surgery centers to apply for CONs; and authorizes the application of a destination cancer hospital under certain circumstances. SB 433 was signed into law by Governor Perdue on April 9th.

Specifically related to Nursing, the following bills were approved by the General Assembly:

H.B. 977--Authorizes an exemption from insurance premium taxes and a deduction on income taxes on certain high deductible health savings accounts. We will continue to monitor this measure as it is sent to the Governor for his approval.

H.B. 1041--Eliminates obsolete language relating to graduate nurses and requires fingerprint record checks for applicants for licensure as a registered professional nurse.

H.B. 1222--Requires health care licensing boards, including the Board of Nursing, to issue special licenses for retired nurses to provide their services for free to the indigent under certain conditions.

An important measure the Georgia Nurses Association helped defeat this year was SB 498 and HB 1323, companion bills that would restrict access to Georgia consumers by requiring physician review of every patient before cosmetic laser surgery could be performed. This proposal would have significantly limited the practice area of many Georgia nurses that provide these services.

Regarding the FY 2009 appropriations process, the Georgia Nurses Association initiated preliminary discussions regarding a Nursing Workforce Center to collect and analyze Georgia's nursing workforce data so that we can better understand and address our nursing shortage issues. Although this initiative did not receive funding this year, it will be a priority for GNA during the next year's budget planning cycle that begins this summer.

Thank you for your participation throughout this legislative session. GNA's legislative efforts are only as successful as its member involvement.

As reported by GNA Lobbyists Jay Morgan and Wendi Clifton