Logo

Log In Sign Up |  An official publication of: American College of Emergency Physicians
Navigation
  • Home
  • Multimedia
    • Podcasts
    • Videos
  • Clinical
    • Airway Managment
    • Case Reports
    • Critical Care
    • Guidelines
    • Imaging & Ultrasound
    • Pain & Palliative Care
    • Pediatrics
    • Resuscitation
    • Trauma & Injury
  • Resource Centers
    • mTBI Resource Center
  • Career
    • Practice Management
      • Benchmarking
      • Reimbursement & Coding
      • Care Team
      • Legal
      • Operations
      • Quality & Safety
    • Awards
    • Certification
    • Compensation
    • Early Career
    • Education
    • Leadership
    • Profiles
    • Retirement
    • Work-Life Balance
  • Columns
    • ACEP4U
    • Airway
    • Benchmarking
    • Brief19
    • By the Numbers
    • Coding Wizard
    • EM Cases
    • End of the Rainbow
    • Equity Equation
    • FACEPs in the Crowd
    • Forensic Facts
    • From the College
    • Images in EM
    • Kids Korner
    • Medicolegal Mind
    • Opinion
      • Break Room
      • New Spin
      • Pro-Con
    • Pearls From EM Literature
    • Policy Rx
    • Practice Changers
    • Problem Solvers
    • Residency Spotlight
    • Resident Voice
    • Skeptics’ Guide to Emergency Medicine
    • Sound Advice
    • Special OPs
    • Toxicology Q&A
    • WorldTravelERs
  • Resources
    • ACEP.org
    • ACEP Knowledge Quiz
    • Issue Archives
    • CME Now
    • Annual Scientific Assembly
      • ACEP14
      • ACEP15
      • ACEP16
      • ACEP17
      • ACEP18
      • ACEP19
    • Annals of Emergency Medicine
    • JACEP Open
    • Emergency Medicine Foundation
  • About
    • Our Mission
    • Medical Editor in Chief
    • Editorial Advisory Board
    • Awards
    • Authors
    • Article Submission
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Subscribe
    • Privacy Policy
    • Copyright Information

Opinion: State Medical Boards’ Licensing Rules Can Be Difficult to Understand

By John G. Boulet, MD | on September 14, 2015 | 0 Comment
Break Room
  • Tweet
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
Print-Friendly Version

[In response to “Feel Like a Criminal? Compact to the Rescue,” April 2015]

You Might Also Like
  • Interstate Compact May Simplify Getting a Medical License in a New State
  • ACEP Clarifies Campaign Rules
  • Opinion: Emergency Physicians Need Better Education on Medical Cannabis
Explore This Issue
ACEP Now: Vol 34 – No 09 – September 2015

My own experience with licensing authorities in two states highlights the incomprehensibility of state medical boards’ rules sometimes.

  1. When I left Texas in 2007 after eight years of being licensed there, which required original-source notarized documentation, and then considered a return to Texas, I was told by TSBME [the Texas State Board of Medical Examiners] that I would have to redo the entire process, including the original documents that Texas had itself used in 1999 to license me there to begin with! I asked the TSBME if that means that they don’t trust their own process for initial and ongoing licensure, valid through my departure in 2007. The response was, “The rules are the rules!”
  2. When I considered moving to Tennessee recently, the Tennessee State Board told me that, because I had done a fellowship 26 years ago in Tennessee, I would have to provide 26 years’ worth of documentation of my CME activity, and pay 26 years’ worth of licensing fees, to get re-licensed in Tennessee. I told the Tennessee Board that since these items would not have been required if I had never set foot inside Tennessee to begin with, their policy makes no sense—to require less documentation because I had never previously been there! Response? None … complete silence and lack of response.

—John G. Boulet, MD
Huntsville, Alabama

Topics: Emergency PhysicianLicense

Related

  • ACEP Defending “Prudent Layperson” in Court

    September 5, 2018 - 0 Comment
  • Impact Is Defined by the Importance of the Moment, Not the Size of the Action

    August 21, 2018 - 1 Comment
  • Stress Echo Offers Alternative to Coronary CT for Chest-pain Triage in the Emergency Department

    July 5, 2018 - 0 Comment

Current Issue

ACEP Now: July 2025

Download PDF

Read More

No Responses to “Opinion: State Medical Boards’ Licensing Rules Can Be Difficult to Understand”

Leave a Reply Cancel Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


*
*

Wiley
  • Home
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy
  • Terms of Use
  • Advertise
  • Cookie Preferences
Copyright © 2025 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved, including rights for text and data mining and training of artificial technologies or similar technologies. ISSN 2333-2603