G. GETTING TO KNOW YOUR PROFESSIONAL COMMUNITY
Here are some proactive approaches for clinicians who want to become familiar with their professional community and take advantage of the learning opportunities that exist there:
- Read your professional practice act. Know how your scope of practice is defined in statute and regulations, including the rules (if any) for how your scope of practice can be advanced.
- Get to know the members of your licensing board: check out their profiles on the board’s website and/or attend a board meeting. Identify board members who understand scope of practice regulation, and reach out to them before a crisis occurs. See section IV-E for
- Participate in practice development or maintenance where you work—for example, in institutional professional practice committees.
- Attend a meeting of your state professional association, and offer yourself as a resource to those who have questions about reproductive health.
- Form a practice group to apply your professional code of ethics or conduct to ethical issues in reproductive health and abortion care that are relevant to your practice.
- Seek membership on practice-related advisory councils associated with primary care or women’s health. These councils may be at the level of a professional practice organization, the state department of health, the state/county public health system, or a state licensing board.
- Request a private meeting with the association’s leadership to talk about your practice and the issues that are most important to you.
- Attend statewide conferences, and submit proposals for workshops focused on the evidence Toolkit Section I-II as a template.
- Seek appointment to advisory committees and task forces that provide input to your state licensing board or to national councils representing state licensing boards.
- Offer testimony at state and national hearings on the subjects of proposed regulatory changes, prescriptive authority, or reimbursement schemes.
- Respond to invitations to review, edit, or provide feedback on circulated drafts of professional and regulatory policies that directly affect APC education and practice.
- Use your professional role in the service of your communities: on the PTA, in neighborhood associations, and in other volunteer roles that interest you.