Protect Yourself, Protect Your Career: Get Informed About Nurse Licensure

Edie Brous, JD, MS, MPH, RN, is a nurse and attorney in New York City and the coordinator of AJN‘s Legal Clinic column.

By Daniel X. O'Neil/via Flickr By Daniel X. O’Neil/via Flickr

I just came back from speaking at a conference where I had the same experience I have every time I speak with nurses about licensure issues. Participants say I am telling them things they didn’t know before.

Nurses who have been in practice for decades didn’t know their state requires nursing board notification of name or address changes within a certain number of days. They didn’t know that criminal convictions, even unrelated to nursing practice, can lead to disciplinary action on their nursing licenses. They didn’t know that it is considered professional misconduct to default on child support payments. They didn’t know that discipline in one state can result in discipline in another state, even when the license in that second state is inactive or expired.

Misconceptions about state boards of nursing. Many nurses do not understand the mission of the nursing board and think that the board is supposed to be an advocate for individual nurses or for the nursing profession. In fact, the board’s mission is to protect the public. Members of the board of nursing are not there to advocate for you, but to protect the public from […]