Bills · 2013-2014 Regular Session
Relating to: required notices by a health care provider who orders a test for the presence of Lyme disease. (FE)
Data processing Disease District attorney Health services, department of — Health Physician
- Introduced, stopped here
- Passes Assembly, not reached
- Passes Senate, not reached
- Governor signs, not reached
- Law, not reached
Unfamiliar terms? Glossary
What this bill does
Plain-language analysis by the nonpartisan Legislative Reference Bureau
Under current law, the Department of Health Services (DHS) must conduct
various activities related to researching, monitoring, and providing education about
the spread and incidence of Lyme disease in humans, including developing and
distributing information about Lyme disease through the offices of physicians and
local health departments. This bill requires the Department of Health Services
(DHS) to create and make available on the Internet a form with a notice for patients
who receive certain specified laboratory tests for the presence of Lyme disease. The
form must contain a notice informing the patient: 1) about the prevalence of Lyme
disease in the United States; 2) about the potential for a false negative or false
positive test result for the presence of Lyme disease; and 3) that a patient whose test
is negative should contact his or her health care provider about being retested for
Lyme disease if the patient continues to experience symptoms. The bill requires a
health care provider who orders a specified test for the presence of Lyme disease for
a patient to provide the patient with a copy of the form and requires DHS to update
the form annually to account for the most recent statistics and for additional tests
that are developed to detect the presence of Lyme disease and that warrant the
notice.