The Rules and Regulations document is a more specific document that helps to interpret the Practice Act. The current Practice Act does not have a Rules and Regulations document to interpret it - it is in the process of being developed and passed in the legislation. Since the new Rules and Regulations were worked on by both veterinarians and technicians some compromises had to be made to create a document all sides could agree with. The finished document is ready to be presented and passed in the legislative session in January. However, there are two areas of concern that SCAVT believes still need to be addressed. In the Rules and Regulations document, Regulation 120.5 addresses Licensed Technicians and their responsibilities. Section 2 - Direct Supervision - part b. says:

(b) Administration and application of treatments, drugs, medications and immunological agents by parenteral (to include subcutaneous, intradermal, intramuscularly, intraperitoneal and intravenous) and non-parenteral routes, except when in conflict with government regulations.

Direct Supervision means that a veterinarian is available on the premises and within immediate vocal communication of the supervisee. We are concerned because this could be interpreted that legally technicians would not be able to do weekend treatments, etc. without the veterinarian present. This may not be a problem for everyone, but we know there are many veterinarians who depend on their technicians to do treatments, etc. without them needing to be there.

The second concern is that there is no mention of the continuing education requirements for technicians. It only mentions the 30 hours needed by veterinarians every two years and unfortunately the way it is written, it could be interpreted that technicians need to get 30 hours as well. Obviously this would be a hardship for a lot of technicians to have to meet that requirement.

What is being done about these concerns? Sharon Dantzler is the lawyer who drafted the document and both issues have been brought to her attention. She agreed that the continuing education issue needed to be addressed and says the 10 hours every two years requirement will be written into the document in January just before it goes before legislation. But the weekend treatment concern cannot be changed - she says that would not be a simple rewording of an area, but actually moving parts around which is not allowed at this stage of the process. Mrs. Dantzler says the only way to change it now is to pull the entire document and change it, which would mean it could not go before legislation until 2009 or let the current document pass and then try to change that one section with an amendment which would not be able to go into effect until 2009.

SCAVT is trying to explore all avenues to see if both issues can be resolved before it gets passed if possible. We need our fellow technicians to make their veterinarians aware of the potential problems that may come with this new document. Perhaps with veterinarians and technicians working together we can bring enough attention to these concerns that we can get more of a response to changing them.

This webpage has both the Practice Act and current draft of the Rules and Regulation for you to download and read over yourselves. If you have any questions or ideas regarding this issue please email or contact anyone on the SCAVT board. Thank You.

Please note the updated Rules and Regs document which includes the changes discussed above. Hopefully by April or May 2008 these rules and regs will be approved and enforced.