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President-Elect
Past President
Secretary
Treasurer
Director of Nurses
Director of Physicians
Director of Dietitians
Director of Industry
Director of Pharmacy
Newsletter Editor
Trusted Advisor
Treasurers Corner
Checking: $4,777.21
Patillo Donald CD: $10,364.07
Total funds: $15,141.28
The Patillo Donald Fund provides funding for the annual
Patillo Donald Memorial Lecture. This fund is held in
perpetuity in memory of Patillo Donald, a UVA researcher and clinician who provided VASPEN with invaluable leadership and support before her untimely
death.
Donations to the fund may be made at:
VASPEN
c/o Ed Pickett, Treasurer
PO Box 1386
Staunton, VA 24402
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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a final rule enabling registered dietitian nutritionists (RDNs) in the hospital setting to become privileged to independently order therapeutic diets effective July
11, 2014. For now, this rule change ONLY applies to hospitals and critical access hospitals, not long term care
facilities or other care settings. The Academy is working diligently to get this privilege expanded to these care
settings.
Individual dietitians need to be granted privileges at their hospital before writing orders independently. CMS
outlined the processes that they will accept for privileging qualified dietitians in hospitals. Hospitals will have
the flexibility to either
1) Appoint RDs to the medical staff and grant them specific nutritional ordering privileges -- or -2) Authorize ordering privileges without appointment to the medical staff, all through the hospitals appropriate medical staff rules, regulations, and bylaws.
The required and essential medical staff oversight of RDs and their ordering privileges will be ensured if one of
these processes is followed.
Laws in Virginia affecting order writing privileges for RDNs
There is a Virginia law that affects order writing privileges for RDNs, titled Rules and Regulations for the Licensure of Hospitals in Virginia. Section 12 VAC 5-410-260: Dietary service states that All patient diets shall be
ordered in writing by a member of the medical staff. Therefore, until this regulation is changed, RDNs in Virginia may only write independent nutrition orders in hospitals who appoint the RDs to the medical staff (option
1 above). Many hospitals will choose not to do this. Therefore, VAND is working to amend Virginia hospital
licensing regulations to align them with the new federal regulations allowing qualified RDNs to become privileged to order therapeutic diets and nutrition-related therapies such as enteral and parenteral nutrition without becoming members of the medical staff.
Proposed language to update the hospital licensing laws has been shared with our partners at the Medical Society of Virginia and the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association to garner interdisciplinary support for our
efforts. We have spoken with officials from the Virginia Department of Healths Office of Licensure and Certification, who have agreed to submit the proposed change via the fast track process for regulations. The estimated timeline is about 6 months, which is much faster than it would have been if they did not agree to the fast
track process. The steps of this process in Virginia are explained here.
What can nutrition support professionals do in the meantime?
Legislators want to know that their constituents are receiving quality and safe healthcare in a cost-effective
manner. Dietitians should track patient outcomes and improvements in patient safety when the RDNs are
managing the nutrition care plan. Other healthcare providers, such as pharmacists and physicians, can help
track these improvements and/or document the time spent implementing dietitian recommendations as a result of the RDN not having order writing privileges. This helps establish the need for reducing burdensome regulations impeding healthcare professionals from practicing to the full extent of their scope of practice. Legislators also love to hear stories about their constituents having an improved quality of life, so if you have stories
to share about patient care being enhanced by RDN involvement, then please share these with Wendy Phillips
at wp4b@virginia.edu (omitting patient specific identifiers).
For updates to the regulatory process, please check the monthly eBlasts through the Virginia Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, and/or the website at www.eatrightvirginia.org. Additional questions or comments may be
addressed to the VAND President at wp4b@virginia.edu.
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Announcements
Continuing Education and Events
Weekend Warrior Nutrition Support Program at University of Virginia Health System
Saturday and Sunday, March 21 - 22, 2015