question: who can a Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner delegate?

Jules A, MSN · Mar 1, 2009

It is my understanding that ours are basically the same as our Physicians so they can delegate to any of us. Why do you ask?

Akercat · Mar 2, 2009

I'm writing a paper on the role of the Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner and I can't find anywhere online if and can they can delegate tasks. So you are saying that they can delegate tasks to just about anyone? such as RNs? What kind of tasks can they actually delegate? Thanks so much!

core0 · Mar 2, 2009

I'm writing a paper on the role of the Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner and I can't find anywhere online if and can they can delegate tasks. So you are saying that they can delegate tasks to just about anyone? such as RNs? What kind of tasks can they actually delegate? Thanks so much!

A. You might try asking this in the NP forum where you may get more answers.

B. Its going to be state dependent based on what the nurse practice act allows.

David Carpenter, PA-C

zenman · Mar 2, 2009

I'm writing a paper on the role of the Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner and I can't find anywhere online if and can they can delegate tasks. So you are saying that they can delegate tasks to just about anyone? such as RNs? What kind of tasks can they actually delegate? Thanks so much!

As another poster said they are basically the same as a physician. So, I would not think there would be any delegation of management tasks for example, only patient orders. I don't see physicians or NP delegating any tasks as they aren't doing any, except those in their job description, and they can only be delegated to a person in the same job category.

Are you talking about delegating to a staff nurse or who?

core0 · Mar 2, 2009

As another poster said they are basically the same as a physician. So, I would not think there would be any delegation of management tasks for example, only patient orders. I don't see physicians or NP delegating any tasks as they aren't doing any, except those in their job description, and they can only be delegated to a person in the same job category.
Are you talking about delegating to a staff nurse or who?

Tasks in medical parlance have a fairly broad reading. For example according to Medicare gathering the patient history is a task and may be delegated to someone else. Physicians in particular have a large amount of leeway in who they can delegate to. In particular depending on their state they delegate a large variety of tasks to unlicensed personnel. There are a variety of requirements but they essentially come down to the fact that the physician must know that they are qualified and assume supervision. For example a physician in an office could delegate the task of administering IV push meds if they knew that the MA was qualified to do this. The issue with NPs in particular is that they also have an underlying RN license that may not allow them to delegate (again depending on the state). For example in the case above in most states an RN could not delegate the task of giving IV push meds to a UAP (or anyone else for that matter). So again depending on the state an NP could not delegate giving IVP meds not based on the NP license but the underlying RN license. This is probably the primary difference between physician and NP delegation. The other prinicipal difference is that the BON usually sets NP practice acts while physician practice acts are set by the BOM. Again depending on the state what may be delegated may be different depending on board rules.

To go back to the OPs original question.

Look at the tasks that a PMNHP can do and then see what can be delegated.

Off the top of my head (and this is definitely not my specialty).

New patient assessment -

Portions of the encounter including history may be delegated

Prescription of medications may not be delegated.

The task of administration of medications is pretty much always delegated.

I'm not sure if therapy is a delegated task or not. My understanding is that in order to charge most of it happens under standing orders.

I'm pretty sure that comittment certification cannot be delegated.

Hopefully that will give a start. Like I commented in my other post you probably should ask a PMHNP what tasks are involved in their job in order to get an idea of what can be delegated.

David Carpenter, PA-C