California Legislature—2015–16 Regular Session

Assembly Bill No. 684

Introduced by Assembly Member Bonilla

February 25, 2015

An act to amend Section 4200.3 of the Business and Professions Code, relating to healing arts.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

AB 684, as introduced, Bonilla. Pharmacy.

Existing law, the Pharmacy Law, provides for the licensure and regulation of pharmacists by the California State Board of Pharmacy within the Department of Consumer Affairs. Existing law authorizes the board to license as a pharmacist an applicant who meets specified requirements, including passage of the North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination. Existing law requires the examination process to meet specified standards and federal guidelines and requires the board to terminate use of that examination if the department determines that the examination fails to meet those standards. Existing law requires the board to report to the now obsolete Joint Committee on Boards, Commissions, and Consumer Protection and the department specified examination pass rate information.

This bill would instead require the board to report that pass rate information to the appropriate policy committees of the Legislature and the department. The bill would also make nonsubstantive changes to those provisions.

Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.  

Section 4200.3 of the Business and Professions
Code is amended to read:

4200.3.  

(a) The examination process shall be regularly
reviewed pursuant to Section 139.

(b) The examination process shall meet the standards and
guidelines set forth in the Standards for Educational and
Psychological Testing and the begin delete Federal end delete begin insert federal end insert Uniform Guidelines
begin delete for end delete begin insert on end insert Employee Selection Procedures. The board shall work with
the Office of Professional Examination Services of the department
or with an equivalent organization who shall certify at minimum
once every five years that the examination process meets these
national testing standards. If the department determines that the
examination process fails to meet these standards, the board shall
terminate its use of the North American begin delete Pharmacy end delete begin insert Pharmacist end insert
Licensure Examination and shall use only the written and practical
examination developed by the board.

(c) The examination shall meet the mandates of subdivision (a)
of Section 12944 of the Government Code.

(d) The board shall work with the Office of Professional
Examination Services or with an equivalent organization to develop
the state jurisprudence examination to ensure that applicants for
licensure are evaluated on their knowledge of applicable state laws
and regulations.

(e) The board shall annually publish the pass and fail rates for
the pharmacist’s licensure examination administered pursuant to
Section 4200, including a comparison of historical pass and fail
rates before utilization of the North American Pharmacist Licensure
Examination.

(f) begin insert   end insert begin insert (1) end insert  The board shall report to the begin delete Joint Committee on Boards,
Commissions, and Consumer Protection end delete begin insert appropriate policy
committees of the Legislature end insert and the department as part of its
next scheduled review, the pass rates of applicants who sat for the
national examination compared with the pass rates of applicants
who sat for the prior state examination. This report shall be a
component of the evaluation of the examination process that is
based on psychometrically sound principles for establishing
minimum qualifications and levels of competency.

begin insert

(2) This subdivision shall become inoperative on January 1,
2020, pursuant to Section 10231.5 of the Government Code.

end insert