CALL-TO-ACTION

Written By Lori Cedarstrom

WE NEED YOU AT THE ARIZONA STATE CAPITOL!

1000 Widows | Isolated to Death has been working with the state legislature on the following MEDICAL FREEDOM bills and will send out a SAVE-THE-DATE with more information once these bills have been placed on a House Health and Human Services (HHS) committee agenda.

The Arizona State Legislature House HHS meets on Mondays @ 2:00pm. There are ONLY three more opportunities for the HHS to hear these very important bills and we have yet to know which Monday they will be on an agenda. So, in the meantime, please make yourself available for Monday, January 30th, Monday, February 6th, or Monday, February 13th.

As soon as the HHS committee notifies us of which Monday they will hear the bills, we will let you know!

HB2503 - Patient visitation; hospitals

  • During a public health emergency, HB2503 will require hospitals and behavioral health residential facilities to to allow for the patient to be accompanied by at least two visitors of the patient's choice, and the patient must be free to change the identity of these visitors as often as the patient wishes.

  • If a serious possibility exists that the patient will lose consciousness or die within 24 hours, or if the patient has lost consciousness, visitation policies must allow all member's of the patient's immediate family and a clergy member to visit the patient immediately and on demand unless the patient has expressed a contrary preference.

  • Hospitals are prohibited from placing time restrictions on patient visitation, and are allowed to exclude visitors from specific areas.

  • Hospitals are required to allow patients to communicate promptly and on demand with any person of their choice.

HB2476 - Health care institutions; provider; liability

  • Repeals statute protecting a health professional or health care institution that acts in good faith to provide health care services in support of the state's response to a state of emergency for a public health pandemic from liability for civil damages, with some exceptions. 

HB2475 - Hospitals; early treatment protocols; COVID-19

  • Hospitals, Long Term Care and Assisted Living Facilities shall develop an early treatment protocol policy for COVID-19 including its variants and any pandemic disease indicated in a declared public health emergency to include the use of all available off-label therapeutics that are reasonable and acceptable through case reports and published scientific studies from either the National Institutes of Health or the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

  • The patient or patient’s advocate must document this request and the healthcare facility shall not be held liable for providing early treatment protocols.

HB2468 - Unprofessional conduct; health professionals

  • Health professionals are required to acknowledge and comply with the patient's rights.

  • A violation is an act of unprofessional conduct and is subject to disciplinary action. 

  • The list of actions constituting unprofessional conduct for licensees of the Arizona Medical Board or the Board of Osteopathic Examiners in Medicine and Surgery is expanded to include failing to provide adequate informed patient consent for any treatment provided to a patient and to document the informed patient consent in the patient's medical record.

Lori Cedarstrom