Personnel Licensure Updates: California, New York and Washington D.C.

Across the country, the beginning of a new year brings with it new legislative proposals for potential consideration. Since the beginning of this year, there has been licensure related activity in California, New York and Washington D.C., as summarized below. It is important for cytotechnologists and pathologists to be vigilant concerning licensurerelated activities in our community. The stringency of state licensure laws can negatively impact scope of practice and recruitment of highly qualified cytotechnologists. The licensure law of one state can also potentially affect laboratories located in other states as is described below in New York. The American Society of Cytopathology (ASC) has published Guidelines and Resources for Cytotechnologist State Licensure and encourages its members to urge state legislatures to consider these guidelines as model language to describe the qualifications and scope of practice of cytotechnologists.1