Georgia Licensure Bill History
Hello Fellow Imaging Professionals,
Georgia remains one of only 11 states that do not license medical imaging professionals, and our current state regulations (a minimum of six hours of radiation safety training) are definitely inadequate and not even being enforced due to budget cuts. The issue is patient safety. Patients assume that anyone given the responsibility of performing a medical imaging procedure is properly trained; however, there are still many offices, urgent care centers, pain clinics, and other areas that employ untrained or undertrained personnel to operate x-ray, fluoroscopy, and advanced imaging modalities.
Last spring, Georgia Senator Tommie Williams introduced a medical imaging licensure bill into the state senate. He did this after learning some of the issues facing imaging professionals in Georgia and, in his haste to get it into the legislative session, he pulled an old radiologic technology licensure bill. This bill stated that anyone operating x-ray equipment must be a registered technologist. Those of you have been around awhile will remember that this bill never got anywhere due to opposition from physicians who did not want to hire both a medical assistant and radiologic technologist.
Over the past several months, members of the GSRT have reviewed successful bills from other states and consulted with Christine Lung and others at the American Society of Radiologic Technologists to revise the bill into something that will protect the public from unnecessary radiation exposure and non-diagnostic imaging exams and, perhaps, better meet the needs of the medical community. The new draft of the bill is posted for your review. It differs from the original version in that is does include a provision for a limited x-ray machine operator and a grandfathering clause for individuals who have been taking radiographs in a physicians’ office for over three years.
Representatives from the GSRT have already begun meeting with lobbyists from medical organizations and are setting appointments with legislators. We need support from the Georgia Hospital Association, Georgia Radiological Society, Medical Association of Georgia, among others. There is not money in the GSRT budget to hire a lobbyist, so this will be a purely grassroots effort and we need your support. Please spread the word to fellow technologists and let your radiologists, hospital administrators and others know this bill is out there. Please focus on the patient safety aspect – medical radiation exposure is in the news and has now replaced background radiation as the leading source of exposure.
Please check back in for more information coming soon – including information on how to contact your local legislator. In the meantime, if you have comments or would like to become more involved, please email me at gsrtvicepresident@gmail.com
Respectfully submitted,
Lynn Clavijo, M.S., R.T.(R)
GSRT Vice President and Legislative Chair