Subject of Possible Rule Making: Animal health care tasks for and supervision of veterinary technicians and veterinary medication clerks.

The veterinary board of governors (board) is considering updates and revisions to WAC 246-935-050 Animal health care tasks, 246-935-040 Responsibilities of a veterinarian supervising a licensed veterinary technician or unregistered assistant, 246-935-010 Definitions (veterinary technicians), and 246-937-010 Definitions (registered veterinary medication clerks).

Reasons Why Rules on this Subject may be Needed and What They Might Accomplish: The board is considering general industry updates to the animal health care tasks rule to review all allowable animal tasks, prohibited animal tasks, consider new tasks, and set appropriate delegation standards for animal chiropractic care. Definitions and responsibilities for other veterinarian professions may need to be updated to keep any amendments made in WAC 246-935-050 consistent.

In 2018, the chiropractic quality assurance commission (chiropractic commission) approached the board expressing a desire to collaborate with the board to determine whether qualified chiropractors could practice chiropractic care on animals. The purpose of the collaboration was to consider whether rules could be adopted to regulate such practice.

A committee was created and the board and chiropractic commission, along with interested parties, considered and discussed this topic between 2018 and 2023 in a series of public meetings. Together, the board and chiropractic commission determined additional specific training is necessary to provide chiropractic adjustment on animals. Both licensed veterinarians and chiropractors typically attend these specialized trainings.

Other Federal and State Agencies that Regulate this Subject and the Process Coordinating the Rule with These Agencies: None.

Interested parties can participate in the decision to adopt the new rule and formulation of the proposed rule before publication by contacting Poppy Budrow, P.O. Box 47852, Olympia, WA 98504-7852, phone 564-669-0026, fax 360-236-2901, TTY 711, email poppy.budrow@doh.wa.gov, website https://doh.wa.gov, veterinary@doh.wa.gov.

Additional comments: Notices will be emailed through the program's GovDelivery interested parties list. To sign up, please go to https://public.govdelivery.com/accounts/WADOH/subscriber/new. Interested parties will be invited to participate in meetings and rule drafting workshops. At the formal proposal stage of rule making, proposed rule language will be posted on the department's rules comments website to receive public comment for the public hearing.