CERTIFICATION OF ENROLLMENT
SUBSTITUTE SENATE BILL 5228
Chapter 96, Laws of 2021
67TH LEGISLATURE
2021 REGULAR SESSION
MEDICAL SCHOOLS—HEALTH EQUITY
EFFECTIVE DATE: July 25, 2021
Passed by the Senate February 26, 2021
  Yeas 31  Nays 17
DENNY HECK

President of the Senate
Passed by the House April 5, 2021
  Yeas 56  Nays 42
LAURIE JINKINS

Speaker of the House of Representatives
CERTIFICATE
I, Brad Hendrickson, Secretary of the Senate of the State of Washington, do hereby certify that the attached is SUBSTITUTE SENATE BILL 5228 as passed by the Senate and the House of Representatives on the dates hereon set forth.
BRAD HENDRICKSON

Secretary
Secretary
Approved April 16, 2021 10:51 AM
FILED
April 16, 2021
JAY INSLEE

Governor of the State of Washington
Secretary of State
State of Washington

SUBSTITUTE SENATE BILL 5228

Passed Legislature - 2021 Regular Session
State of Washington
67th Legislature
2021 Regular Session
BySenate Higher Education & Workforce Development (originally sponsored by Senators Randall, Liias, Das, Lovelett, Nobles, Wilson, C., Darneille, Hasegawa, Keiser, Kuderer, Nguyen, and Robinson)
READ FIRST TIME 02/05/21.
AN ACT Relating to addressing disproportionate health outcomes by building a foundation of equity in medical training; adding new sections to chapter 28B.10 RCW; and creating a new section.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:
NEW SECTION.  Sec. 1. The legislature finds that inequities in health outcomes exist in the state of Washington and that future generations of health care professionals have an important role to play in mitigating these disparate outcomes. Because the schools of medicine at the University of Washington and Washington State University are tasked with the formative role of educating medical professionals, the legislature sees fit to ensure students leaving these institutions are prepared to care effectively for the people of diverse cultures, groups, and communities that will become their patients. By equipping them with the tools to serve diverse communities around our state and our nation, students of medicine will become practitioners of medicine with the knowledge, attitudes, and skills to understand and counteract racism and implicit bias in health care. The purpose of this act is to serve medical students, medical professionals, and patients in communities in which these professionals work, and to undo structural racism in the systems through which they navigate. To that end, this act establishes opportunities for education that provide tools to students of medicine to build a better, more equitable health care system.
NEW SECTION.  Sec. 2. A new section is added to chapter 28B.10 RCW to read as follows:
(1) Within existing resources, by January 1, 2023, the school of medicine at the University of Washington, established under chapter 28B.20 RCW, and the school of medicine at Washington State University, established under chapter 28B.30 RCW, shall each develop curriculum on health equity for medical students. The curriculum must teach attitudes, knowledge, and skills that enable students to care effectively for patients from diverse cultures, groups, and communities. The objectives of the curriculum must be to provide tools for eliminating structural racism in health care systems and to build cultural safety. A person may not graduate with a degree from either medical school without completing a course, or courses, that include curriculum on health equity for medical students.
(2) Course topics on health equity may include, but are not limited to:
(a) Strategies for recognizing patterns of health care disparities and eliminating factors that influence them;
(b) Intercultural communication skills training, including how to work effectively with an interpreter and how communication styles differ across cultures;
(c) Historical examples of medical and public health racism and how racism may manifest itself in a student's field of medicine;
(d) Cultural safety training that requires examination of each student's culture and potential impacts on clinical interactions and health care service delivery;
(e) Structural competency training that gives attention to forces influencing health outcomes at levels above individual interactions;
(f) Methods of evaluating health care systems; and
(g) Implicit bias training to identify strategies to reduce bias during assessment and diagnosis.
NEW SECTION.  Sec. 3. A new section is added to chapter 28B.10 RCW to read as follows:
(1) Within existing resources, by January 1, 2022, the school of medicine at the University of Washington, established under chapter 28B.20 RCW, and the school of medicine at Washington State University, established under chapter 28B.30 RCW, shall each develop a goal focused on increasing the number of underrepresented students at each school of medicine, guided by the state of Washington's need for physicians from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds and each school's predominant equity goals. In developing the goal, special consideration may be given to students attending the school of medicine at the University of Washington as a part of a regional partnership with other states. Each initial goal shall be set for January 1, 2025.
(2) The school of medicine at the University of Washington and the school of medicine at Washington State University shall report progress towards their goal on an annual basis through their public websites.
Passed by the Senate February 26, 2021.
Passed by the House April 5, 2021.
Approved by the Governor April 16, 2021.
Filed in Office of Secretary of State April 16, 2021.
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