Nurses occupy a special place of trust. Their patients are often vulnerable and completely dependent on the nurse for their care. Patients and their family members must be able to trust the safety, skill, fitness, and integrity of a nurse. State nursing boards have an obligation to protect patients and the public against unsafe nursing. If you find yourself involved in a child welfare matter, perhaps in a dispute with the other parent of your own children who alleges your child abuse or neglect, then state nursing board disciplinary officials are very likely to take a strong interest in ensuring your fitness for continued nursing practice. Your nursing license is at risk. Retain the Lento Law Firm's premier Professional License Defense Team for your best possible nursing license disciplinary outcome. Our skilled and strategic attorneys are available nationwide for nursing license defense on child welfare and other issues. Call 888.535.3686 or complete this contact form now for our premier attorneys' strategic representation.
The Nature of Child Welfare Proceedings
You are here for information about nursing license disciplinary proceedings, not to learn all about child welfare proceedings. However, because your licensing issue relates to your involvement in a child welfare proceeding, you need to know a little about the nature of that child welfare proceeding to understand how it may impact your nursing license. Without belaboring details and instead only addressing the subject as it relates to your nursing license, a child welfare proceeding generally involves allegations that your conduct was abused or your failure to act neglected a child in your care. Child welfare proceedings typically find their legal basis in child protective services statutes and systems addressing child abuse and neglect allegations. Child welfare proceedings thus typically involve investigations by state social workers with law enforcement review and support. Child welfare cases may result in civil restraining orders, child abuse database registration, and, in some cases, criminal charges. Child welfare cases can thus take on the character of mixed civil and criminal proceedings, where orders, restraints, and even arrest and incarceration are all on the table.
Why Child Welfare Cases Raise License Issues
You can see from the above description why child welfare cases can lead to state nursing board license investigations and discipline. The nurse who abuses or neglects a child, requiring a civil or criminal case restraining order and exposing the nurse to criminal prosecution, can present a distinct threat to patient safety, especially when the patients are children or other vulnerable individuals. State nursing boards have the statutory and regulatory obligation to protect patients and the public. They do so through both licensing qualifications and license discipline. Section 314.091 of the Kentucky Nurse Practice Act is an example, authorizing the Kentucky Board of Nursing to suspend or revoke a nursing license whenever the nurse demonstrates unfitness to practice, threatening patient safety. Your state nursing board employs disciplinary officials to be on the lookout for disciplinary grounds, for which child welfare issues are clearly one potential trigger. Don't question your state nursing board's legitimate concern over your child welfare issue. Instead, retain our attorneys to raise your best license defense.
How Child Welfare Differs from Family Law Issues
If you are involved in a divorce or other family law dispute, say for paternity, child custody, or child support, don't assume that you will face licensing issues. Child welfare matters like those described above are not the same as straightforward cases for paternity, child custody, or child support. Those family law matters would ordinarily not involve allegations of child abuse or neglect. Abuse or neglect allegations may arise in connection with a divorce or other family law cases, but that is much more often not the case and a child welfare proceeding differs from ordinary family law cases. Again, don't fret unnecessarily over your family law case. Instead, be on the lookout for child abuse or neglect allegations. And retain us to protect your nursing license the moment you get wind of any such allegations. We may be able to take early steps to head off a state nursing board license investigation.
How Child Welfare Cases May Arise
As just mentioned, divorce, child custody, and child support cases do not necessarily involve child welfare issues arising out of abuse and neglect allegations. However, child custody and child support cases can trigger child abuse and neglect allegations. Parties to a child custody and support case obviously have significant interests in prevailing, especially so that they may have child custody and avoid child support. Those very strong interests, backed by all the natural emotion over child relationships and child-rearing issues, can lead to both true and false child abuse and neglect allegations. True allegations would be to ensure the child's appropriate care and custody. A desperate party may raise false allegations, though, in an effort to influence custody and support rulings. It wouldn't be the first time if that happened to be your very unfortunate case, facing false abuse and neglect allegations. Abuse and neglect allegations may alternatively arise out of your casual contact with a relative's child or children in your care as a charitable volunteer.
Immediate Response to Child Welfare Allegations
No matter how your child abuse and neglect allegations arise, be sure to retain us immediately upon learning of those allegations so that we can prepare your nursing license defense. You should, of course, also retain qualified local criminal defense or family law representation in the child abuse case. However, in the bigger picture, your nursing license proceeding may reflect your much greater risk and interest. If, for instance, child welfare allegations arise out of your volunteer or casual contact with another's child, you may be more than willing to cease all contact with that child. Your counsel in the child welfare case may even recommend a workout that results in that arrangement. Yet you could still lose your nursing license, job, and career over the child abuse allegation if you do not have our skilled, strategic, and effective representation. Your immediate response should be to retain us.
Our Responsive Role in License Protection
Once you retain us, we can go promptly to work identifying and gathering the exonerating and mitigating evidence you will need to present to the state nursing board in a clear and convincing fashion to avoid crippling license discipline. That evidence may include photographs, surveillance video, medical examination records, medical consults, forensic reviews and opinions, police reports, and witness statements, among other physical evidence, items, and materials. Our prompt intervention may preserve or restore critical family, friend, and professional relationships on which you may need to rely for your license defense. Our early intervention may also enable a prompt, thorough, accurate, and convincing response to your state nursing board's investigator if and when the investigator initiates the disciplinary case and contacts you for an interview or other response. We cannot emphasize enough that our early retention may make for your successful license defense, while our late retention or non-retention may break your defense case.
Child Welfare Proceeding Results
Again, without belaboring details and instead only addressing the subject as it relates to your nursing license, your child welfare proceeding may have differing results that may differently impact your nursing license proceeding. Some child welfare investigations result in findings that the allegations were unfounded, even fabricated. That result should ease our defense of your license disciplinary proceeding, especially if the child welfare caseworker thoroughly documents the finding of unfounded or fabricated allegations.
Other child welfare investigations result in findings of founded but insufficient allegations, in which some evidence of abuse or neglect may exist, but that evidence is not sufficiently credible or substantial for child abuse or neglect orders and sanctions. That result may require us to present additional evidence to protect your nursing license, especially insofar as the evidentiary standards, proof burdens, and substantive law standards differ in each proceeding. Your state nursing board may have significantly greater authority to limit or suspend your license on less evidence than a judge in a child welfare case would need to restrain you, deny your child custody or parenting time, or criminally convict you for child abuse or neglect.
If, on the other hand, the child welfare case results in findings of probable child abuse and neglect, and the court mandates your supervision, counseling, restraint, loss of child custody and visitation, or other interventions, then those findings and sanctions may substantially complicate but not entirely defeat our license defense. We may still be able to show the state nursing board that your nursing practice does not involve children or similarly vulnerable individuals and that your alleged or proven misconduct in the child welfare case does not establish your unfitness for nursing practice. With your approval, we may also be able to negotiate appropriate compromise conditions and restrictions that preserve your nursing license, employment, and income.
The Difference of a License Proceeding
We have already briefly described above the nature of a child welfare proceeding and how it differs from an ordinary divorce, paternity, child custody, or child support case. Here, consider how a license disciplinary proceeding differs from a child welfare proceeding. A license disciplinary proceeding is an administrative proceeding, not a court proceeding. Your state nursing board has the statutory authority to open its own administrative disciplinary case against you or to invoke an administrative law tribunal to do so without court involvement. Nursing board officials, not public prosecutors, will pursue your license discipline. License discipline does not ordinarily involve your broad restraint, fine, criminal prosecution, or incarceration, as your child welfare case might. License discipline instead only directly affects your nursing license, although with collateral consequences on your nursing job and career.
Nursing Board Abuse and Neglect Discipline
State nursing practice acts make clear that state nursing boards have disciplinary authority relating to child abuse and neglect, or risks of abuse and neglect, by their licensed nurses. Examine the disciplinary grounds in your state nursing practice act or its implementing regulations, and you will likely find either specific mention of the risk or occurrence of patient abuse or neglect or general provisions that would cover patient abuse or neglect risks. The Nevada Nurse Practice Act is an example. Nevada Administrative Code Section 632.895, adopted by the Nevada Board of Nursing to carry out its statutory patient-protection obligation, expressly authorizes the Board's disciplinary officials to suspend or revoke a nurse's license for abuse or neglect or other acts demonstrating unfitness to practice. You face a real and substantial risk of state nursing board license discipline based on allegations of child abuse or neglect in your child welfare case. Do not minimize your risk of license discipline. Instead, retain us to prepare and present your best license defense case.
Nursing Board Disciplinary Sanctions
License suspension and revocation are your greater risks of license discipline relating to child abuse or neglect allegations in your child welfare case. License suspension is generally the default sanction to which state nursing board disciplinary officials will turn unless a respondent nurse makes a good showing in response to serious disciplinary grounds. State nursing practice acts routinely authorize both license suspension and revocation for unfitness approaching the level of child abuse or neglect, as evidenced by a child welfare proceeding. However, state nursing practice acts also routinely authorize alternative sanction forms, giving our attorneys the opportunity to argue for alternative remedial measures that can achieve the board's patient-protection interests while preserving your nursing license and practice. Section 678.111 of the Oregon Nurse Practice Act provides an example, authorizing not just license suspension or revocation but, alternatively, license censure, license probation with or without conditions and limitations, license reprimand, remedial education or training, and fines or restitution. Let us present your best case for mitigated or no sanctions.
What Else You Have at Stake in Board Proceedings
While your license discipline up to suspension or revocation may appear to be your greatest risk in a state nursing board disciplinary proceeding over child welfare involvement, you may face collateral consequences that carry even greater impacts on your personal and professional matters. If you lose your current nursing license in your current state of nursing practice, you could lose nursing licenses you hold in other states, along with the opportunity to gain reciprocal licenses in other states. You could also lose other healthcare licenses you hold and the opportunity to gain those other healthcare licenses that you might want to hold. Your nursing license discipline could, in other words, end your healthcare career nationwide, not just in nursing and not just in your current state of nursing practice. Severe personal and family financial impacts could follow, along with housing, transportation, health insurance, and other issues. Let us help you avoid these potentially dire impacts by mounting your best license defense.
The Possibility of License Reinstatement
If you have already lost your nursing license to disciplinary charges over child abuse or neglect allegations, we may be able to help you gain your license's reinstatement. Some nursing practice acts authorize their state nursing board to offer license reinstatement after suspension or revocation at the board's discretion and pursuant to mandated procedures. The Oregon Nurse Practice Act is, once again, a good example. Section 678.380 of the Act authorizes the Oregon Board of Nursing to adopt rules for reinstatement of a license. Oregon Board of Nursing Rule 851-001-0015 carries out that authority, offering discretionary reinstatement of a revoked license after a three-year wait and on a written application showing appropriate rehabilitation. Do not attempt to pursue license reinstatement on your own with a simple letter. Rules, customs, and procedures generally require comprehensive documentation and compelling argumentation to gain board approval. We can help you make your best possible showing for license reinstatement.
Nursing Board Disclosure Requirements
State nursing practice acts do not uniformly require nurses who may lack fitness for practice to promptly disclose by self-report their potential issues. You may not need to raise your child welfare issues on your own. But if not, your license renewal may require you to do so if the license renewal form asks you to disclose that information. Your false statement or deliberate misleading omission in answer to such a request is very likely independent grounds for your discipline under credential fraud provisions like the one in Maryland's Nurse Practice Act at Section 8-705. Your cover-up may bring more serious license discipline than your alleged child welfare crime. Let us help you determine whether to self-disclose and, if so, how and when. Your report needs to be accurate, complete, and consistent with other evidence. It should also not unduly incriminate you and increase your discipline risks with oversights and inaccuracies.
Nursing Board Reporting Requirements
Whether you disclose your child welfare issues or not, your nursing colleagues may feel duty-bound to report you. Some state nursing practice acts require nurses to report their nursing colleagues when they learn of substantial cause for discipline. For example, Nevada Administrative Code Section 632.890, adopted by the Nevada Board of Nursing under Nevada Nurse Practice Act authority, requires nurses to report another nurse whose conduct violates the Board's disciplinary grounds, including abuse, neglect, and unfitness provisions. Other nurses or healthcare professionals may turn you in. Again, let us help you evaluate how to handle self-disclosures and colleague threats to report. We may be able to help you address concerns without the necessity of a report, or we may help you make a proper and timely report to your better advantage. Your state nursing board may also learn of your child welfare issues through a public media disclosure or a report by your opposing party on the child welfare matter.
Board Procedures Over Licensing Issues
Your state nursing board owes you constitutional due process protections if it determines to pursue a license disciplinary proceeding threatening the revocation or suspension of your license. You have a constitutionally protected liberty and property interest in your nursing employment. Your state nursing practice act likely recognizes your due process rights, perhaps by incorporating your state administrative procedures act's notice, hearing, and appeal provisions. Section 65-1120(b) of the Kansas Nurse Practice Act is an example, both promising certain procedures in disciplinary cases and referring to and incorporating the state Administrative Procedures Act's due process protections. Those due process protections include, at a minimum, the right to fair notice of the charges and a fair hearing before an impartial decision maker. You will also likely have appeal rights and may have to resort to civil court review, depending on your state and the circumstances of your license proceeding.
The Attorney's Role in Nursing Board Procedures
Do not underestimate the necessity and value of our representation. The above due process protections do not execute themselves. We must instead invoke them on your behalf, particularly your right to a hearing. We can present your exonerating witnesses and mitigating evidence at that hearing while cross-examining adverse witnesses and challenging other adverse evidence. If you have already lost your hearing, we can take your appeal to a higher state administrative body or straight to civil court, depending on what your state's laws and procedures provide. Our attorneys know not only what procedures to invoke for your best outcome but also how to deploy those procedures with the greatest strategic effect.
Premier Attorneys for Nursing License Defense
The Lento Law Firm's premier Professional License Defense Team is available for your nursing license defense representation arising out of your child welfare involvement. Our attorneys are available to represent you anywhere across the nation on child welfare licensing issues or other related or distinct disciplinary grounds and issues. We help hundreds of nurses and other professionals successfully defend their license proceedings, including on child welfare issues. Call 888.535.3686 or complete this contact form now for our premier license defense representation.
