Staff Reports
In the 1950s, less than 5% of U.S. workers were required to have an occupational license to do their jobs.
Since then, that number has risen to more than one-quarter of U.S. workers. An estimated 28.7% of the Florida workforce is required to obtain a license from the state just to earn a paycheck.
In 2015, The White House published a report on the current state of occupational licensing in our country finding that too often licensing requirements are inconsistent, inefficient and arbitrary.
Similarly, rules to maintain a professional license can also be inconsistent, inefficient and arbitrary.
The Florida Legislature this year embraced this report when it enacted HB 1193, the “Occupational Freedom and Opportunity Act,” eliminating many costly, unnecessary and inefficient regulations governing many occupational licenses.
According to the White House report, all states mandate some form of continuing medical education for re-licensure, and distance education is a commonly used practice for continuing professional education in licensed occupations.
Many professional education providers are online or distance providers which, the report finds, “may be the most convenient option for professionals for whom taking time away from the office to attend classes or in-person training can be costly.” As is the case for all students, online courses offer many opportunities to gain skills at low cost while following a flexible schedule.
For the vast majority of Florida’s regulated professions — including Realtors, attorneys and most medical professions — online learning has been part of their continuing education programs for years. Yet, chiropractors in our state are only allowed to take 10 of their 40 hours of continuing education online.
Instead of being able to take advantage of the many high-quality online courses available for half the price, Florida chiropractors are required to spend 30 hours attending an expensive live seminar which provides limited content options, requires that they close their practices, and adds unnecessary costs to the profession.
Just as the White House report suggests, this type of government regulation is inefficient for medical professionals, inconsistent with other professional licensure requirements, and arbitrary: If 10 online hours is permissible, why not all 40?
Distance education has been widely embraced and accelerated during this COVD-19 emergency to become a “new normal.” Physicians are treating patients through telemedicine, K-12 schools and universities are implementing online and blended learning models, and professionals across the country are productively working online from home.
More than 3,000 chiropractic physicians have petitioned the Florida Board of Chiropractic Medicine to permit them to complete their continuing education online.
Just as the rest of the country and our state are doing, now is the time for the Florida Board of Chiropractic Medicine to fully embrace online learning continuing education and allow chiropractors to complete all their continuing education requirements either in person or online.
2 comments
Magila
June 10, 2020 at 5:01 pm
The blame for this lies squarely in the lap of the FCA. The Florida Chiropractic Association, and their “executive” leadership; Debra Minor-Brown, as well as legal counsel Paul Lambert worked hard to convince the St. Board of Chiropractic Medicine, not to allow more then 10 hours of on-line education.
The FCA knows full well that allowing all of the hours to be taken on-line would severely impact their bottom line. Not only would they lose money from those attending, and they they would lose exhibitor fee’s.
The attorney for the Fl. Board of Chiropractic Medicine, clearly stated that the board did have the authority to rule in favor of all on-line educational hours. It was the FCA who argued that the board did not have the “authority” to make a ruling. Those on the board, being puppets for the FCA, ruled against their own attorneys advice and claimed that only the State Legislature could make that ruling.
You want to do an interesting: start here.
Stuart Robles, B.A., D.C.
June 11, 2020 at 4:48 pm
When it comes to making changes, of any kind, money is always a great motivator. If you could enhance your financial gain by making a change that if for the greater good, then you would probably do it if possible. On the other hand, which may be the case with the Florida Board, 40 hours of online continuing education would result in the lose of many, many millions of dollars in fees and what those fees will eventually pay for. That is why the Board probably knows what the right thing to do it, but it is just too expensive.
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