Two CNA-sponsored bills signed into law
Legislation tackle medical debt and dearth of clinical placements
By Chuleenan Svetvilas and Lucy Diavolo
National Nurse magazine - Oct | Nov | Dec 2024 Issue
California Nurses Association (CNA) applauded Gov. Gavin Newsom for signing two bills in September and October respectively, Senate Bill 1061, which would prevent medical debt collectors and health care providers from sharing medical debt information with credit reporting agencies, and Senate Bill 1015, an essential step towards ensuring clinical placement opportunities for California’s future nurses, particularly for students attending public institutions like community colleges and state universities
S.B. 1061, authored by Sen. Monique Limón and sponsored by CNA, California Attorney General Rob Bonta, and a diverse coalition of organizations, also prohibits consumer reporting agencies from including medical debt on credit reports.
“With ballooning out-of-pocket health care costs, we need a fair credit system that does not punish California’s patients for seeking health care when they need it,” said CNA President Michelle Gutierrez Vo, RN. “As a nurse, I’ve seen patients who delay care because they are afraid of going into debt. We appreciate Governor Newsom signing S.B. 1061 into law.”
“No Californian should be unable to secure housing, a loan, or even a job because they accessed necessary medical care,” said Sen. Limón. “California is stepping up to protect consumers impacted by the effects of medical debt."
"When someone is scared and in pain, the last thing they should think about is whether seeking care will take away their ability to buy a house or land a job,” said Bonta. “Unfortunately, medical debt appearing on credit reports makes this a common experience for far too many people.”
Nurses have long witnessed patients delay care or forgo essential medical care because of medical debt. At least 1 in 5 (more than 6 million) California adults have medical debt that would not be included in their credit reports because of this bill. Many patients who face damaging medical debt on their credit reports are uninsured or underinsured when they receive hospital or other care. Moreover, medical debt disproportionately impacts marginalized communities. To enforce the prohibition of medical debt on credit reports, that debt would be voided if the information is provided to a credit reporting agency.
S.B. 1015, authored by Sen. Dave Cortese and sponsored by CNA, will mandate new levels of transparency for nursing student clinical placements and begin developing standards for those placements to ensure equitable access. It will empower the California Board of Registered Nursing (BRN) to collect and analyze how BRN-approved programs handle these placements, information that will be presented to the state legislature annually. Additionally, it calls on the BRN’s Nursing Education and Workforce Advisory Committee to recommend standards that will ensure fair and equitable access to clinical placements.
“This commonsense reform will increase transparency around and equitable access to clinical education placements for nursing students across the state,” said Gutierrez Vo. “It is critical that all of California’s future nurses have clinical placement opportunities. This law will help ensure that hospitals and other health care facilities can continue to meet our state’s nursing workforce and staffing needs.”
Clinical placements are an essential and necessary part of nursing education. BRN data shows that, in 2021 and 2022, nursing students at a staggering 92 of California’s 152 nursing programs had been denied access to clinical placements. Nursing schools reported to the BRN that the inability to secure clinical placements was the number two reason for not enrolling more students and that the issue was an acute problem for public nursing education programs.
If those trends continued unchecked, nurses feared the existing dynamic would exacerbate an uneven playing field for students from community colleges and public schools compared to private institutions which have more resources to secure clinical placement spots for their students. Nursing students from community and public schools, however, are vital for ensuring the state’s nursing workforce reflects the diversity of California and provides an affordable pathway into the nursing profession.
Chuleenan Svetvilas and Lucy Diavolo are communications specialists at National Nurses United.