H-1132              _______________________________________________

                                          SUBSTITUTE HOUSE BILL NO. 1089

                        _______________________________________________

State of Washington                               51st Legislature                              1989 Regular Session

By House Committee on Commerce & Labor (originally sponsored by Representatives Prentice, Patrick, Vekich, Braddock, Wang, Cantwell, Cole, Rust, Leonard, Jones, Nelson, R. Fisher, P. King and R. King)

Read first time 1/25/89 and referred to Committee on Appropriations.

AN ACT Relating to reporting of pesticide-related illness; and adding new sections to chapter 70.104 RCW.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1.     (1) Any attending physician or other health care provider recognized as primarily responsible for the diagnosis and treatment of a patient or, in the absence of a primary health care provider, the health care provider initiating diagnostic testing or therapy for a patient shall report a case or suspected case of pesticide poisoning to the department of social and health services in the manner prescribed by, and within the reasonable time periods established by, rules of the state board of health.  Time periods established by the board shall range from immediate reporting to reporting within seven days depending on the severity of the case or suspected case of pesticide poisoning.  The reporting requirements shall be patterned after other board rules establishing requirements for reporting of diseases or conditions.  Confidentiality requirements shall be the same as the confidentiality requirements established for other reportable diseases or conditions.  The board rules shall determine what information shall be reported.  Reports shall be made on forms provided to health care providers by the department of social and health services.  For purposes of any oral reporting, the department of social and health services shall make available a toll-free telephone number.

          (2) Within a reasonable time period as established by board rules, the department of social and health services shall investigate the report of a case or suspected case of pesticide poisoning to document the incident.  The department shall report the results of the investigation to the health care provider submitting the original report.

          (3) Cases or suspected cases of pesticide poisoning shall be reported by the department of social and health services to the local health officer, the department of agriculture, and the department of labor and industries, as appropriate, within the time periods established by state board of health rules.

          (4) Upon request of the primary health care provider, pesticide applicators or employers shall make available to that provider any available information on pesticide applications which may have affected the health of the provider's patient.  This information is to be used only for the purposes of providing health care services to the patient.

          (5) Any failure of a health care provider to make the reports required under this section may be cause for the department of social and health services to submit information about such nonreporting to the applicable disciplining authority for the provider under RCW 18.130.040.

          (6) No cause of action shall arise as the result of:  (a) The failure to report under this section; or (b) any report submitted to the department of social and health services under this section.

          (7) For the purposes of this section, a suspected case of pesticide poisoning is a case in which the diagnosis is thought very likely to be pesticide poisoning.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 2.     The department of social and health services, after seeking advice from the state board of health, local health officers, and state and local medical associations, shall develop and implement a program of medical education to alert physicians and other health care providers to the symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, and reporting of pesticide poisonings.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 3.     The state board of health shall adopt rules in compliance with chapter 34.05 RCW to implement section 1 of this act by January 1, 1990.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 4.     Sections 1 through 3 of this act are each added to chapter 70.104 RCW.