Senator CASH proposed the following amendment (DG\3998C004.NBD.DG22):

Amend the bill, as and if amended, by adding an appropriately numbered SECTION to read:

/ SECTION ___. A. This SECTION may be known and cited as the "Perinatal Integration Act of 2021".

B.Chapter 89, Title 44 of the 1976 Code is amended by adding:

"Section 44-89-110.(A) For the purposes of this section:

(1) 'Integrate' means to facilitate the full exercise of a scope of practice, autonomy, self-regulation, collaboration, and a smooth transition between midwives, birthing centers, and hospitals that provide perinatal services. 'Integrate' does not mean to supervise midwives or birthing centers.

(2) 'Perinatal levels of care' means the regulatory implementation of perinatal services.

(B) The department shall promulgate regulations that recognize midwives within the definition of facilities and integrate midwives and birthing centers into the organization of perinatal levels of care. These regulations must include, but are not limited to:

(1) access to physician-to-provider consultation available twenty-four hours a day;

(2) transfer methods and protocols from a midwife or birthing center to a hospital within a fifty-mile radius that provides level one or higher perinatal services;

(3) access to professional continuing education relating to safe transfers and the escalation of care; and

(4) the collection of data on transfer outcomes to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of the transfer of care from a midwife or birthing center to a hospital.

(C) Nothing in this section may be construed to:

(1) allow or require the department or hospitals to promulgate regulations or requirements that restrict the scope of practice, change existing licensure requirements, or impose any other regulation or requirement on midwives or birthing centers, other than methods and protocols for the transfer of a patient to a hospital; or

(2) require hospitals to give midwives hospital-admitting privileges." /