APN comparison

APN comparison

APN Practice Regulations Comparison between Maine and New Jersey

February 21, 2010

School of Nursing

APN Practice Regulations Comparison between Maine and New Jersey
Nurses work in a wide variety of situations and practice areas such as physician’s offices, insurance companies or health care facilities (Board of Licensure in Medicine, 2006). Due to the vast variety of practice situations, defining a nurse’s role is difficult as each area necessitates a different set of standards for practice based on policies and procedures developed specifically for that facility (BOL, 2006). Additionally each level of nursing mandates specific educational requirements for state licensing and these requirements can vary state to state (Office of the Attorney General, 2009). In order to provide written accountability and responsibility, guidelines have been developed in the form of standardized scope of nursing practice that is precisely written for each level of licensing (Office, 2009). The certification rules and regulations concerning practice environments of advanced practice nurses (APNs) in the states of Maine and New Jersey will be compared and contrasted.
The Maine (ME) Board of Licensure in Medicine (BOLM) and New Jersey’s (NJ) Board of nursing (BON) require collaborative measures for scope of practice between nurse practitioners (NP) and physicians (BOLM, 2006). In Maine, developments of standardized procedures are written through collaboration of administration, nursing, and medicine in an organized health care system in which the NP will practice (BOLM, 2006). Without the development of standardized procedures, the NP must involve the physician in all treating and diagnostic practices (BOLM, 2006). Subsequent to the signing off by the physician, facility and NP of the standardized procedures specific to the agency in which they were developed, the NP’s practice is then regarded as independent (BOLM, 2006). In NJ, an advanced practice nurse (APN)...