Arkansas Administrative Code
Agency 060 - STATE MEDICAL BOARD
Rule 060.00.10-005 - Regulation 17 - Governing Continuing Medical Education
Universal Citation: AR Admin Rules 060.00.10-005
Current through Register Vol. 49, No. 9, September, 2024
REGULATION 34 REQUIREMENTS OF LICENSED PHYSICIANS IN COMPLETING DEATH CERTIFICATES
ACA § 20-18-601 requires physicians in the State of Arkansas to comply with the requirements when completing death certificates. ACA § 17-95-409(a)(2)(P) provides that the Arkansas State Medical Board may revoke or suspend a license of physicians, or impose other sanctions as provided by law, if a licensed physician violates a rule of the Board.
A. A licensed Physician who has been in
charge of a patient's care for the illness or condition that resulted in the
death of the patient shall complete, sign and return to the funeral director
the medical certification on the death certificate within two (2) business days
after receipt of the death certificate, except when an inquiry is required by
law pursuant to ACA §
12-12-315
as set forth herein:
(1) The county coroner,
prosecuting attorney, and either the county sheriff or the chief of police of
the municipality in which the death of a human being occurs shall be promptly
notified by any physician, law enforcement officer, undertaker or embalmer,
jailer, or coroner or by any other person present with knowledge of the death
if:
(A) The death appears to be caused by
violence or appears to be the result of a homicide or a suicide or to be
accidental;
(B) The death appears
to be the result of the presence of drugs or poisons in the body;
(C) The death appears to be the result of a
motor vehicle accident, or the body was found in or near a roadway or
railroad;
(D) The death appears to
be the result of a motor vehicle accident and there is no obvious trauma to the
body;
(E) The death occurs while
the person is in a state mental institution or hospital and there is no
previous medical history to explain the death, or while the person is in police
custody or jail other than a jail operated by the Department of
Correction;
(F) The death appears
to be the result of a fire or an explosion;
(G) The death of a minor child appears to
indicate child abuse prior to death;
(H) Human skeletal remains are recovered or
an unidentified deceased person is discovered;
(I) Postmortem decomposition exists to the
extent that an external examination of the corpse cannot rule out injury, or in
which the circumstances of death cannot rule out the commission of a
crime;
(J) The death appears to be
the result of drowning;
(K) The
death is of an infant or a minor child under eighteen (18) years of
age;
(L) The manner of death
appears to be other than natural;
(M) The death is sudden and
unexplained;
(N) The death occurs
at a work site;
(O) The death is
due to a criminal abortion;
(P) The
death is of a person where a physician was not in attendance within thirty-six
(36) hours preceding death, or, in prediagnosed terminal or bedfast cases,
within thirty (30) days;
(Q) A
person is admitted to a hospital emergency room unconscious and is
unresponsive, with cardiopulmonary resuscitative measures being performed, and
dies within twenty-four (24) hours of admission without regaining consciousness
or responsiveness, unless a physician was in attendance within thirty-six (36)
hours preceding presentation to the hospital, or, in cases in which the
decedent had a prediagnosed terminal or bedfast condition, unless a physician
was in attendance within thirty (30) days preceding presentation to the
hospital;
(R) The death occurs in
the home; or
(S)
(i) The death poses a potential threat to
public health or safety.
(ii) Upon
receiving notice of a death that poses a potential threat to public health or
safety, the county coroner shall immediately notify the Department of
Health.
(2)
Nothing in this section shall be construed to require an investigation,
autopsy, or inquest in any case in which death occurred without medical
attendance solely because the deceased was under treatment by prayer or
spiritual means in accordance with the tenets and practices of a
well-recognized church or religious denomination. With regard to any death in a
correctional facility, the county coroner and the State Medical Examiner shall
be notified, and when previous medical history does not exist to explain the
death, the Department of Arkansas State Police shall be notified.
Or pursuant to ACA 12-12-318; or pursuant to ACA § 14-15-301 et seq as set forth herein:
When a death is reported to a coroner, he shall conduct an investigation concerning the circumstances surrounding the death of an individual and gather and review background information, including, but not limited to, medical information and any other information which may be helpful in determining the cause and manner of death.
B. In the absence of the physician or with
his or her approval, the certificate may be completed and signed by his or her
associate physician, by the chief medical officer of the institution in which
death occurred, by the pathologist who performed an autopsy upon the decedent,
or by a registered nurse as provided in this subsection c, if the individual
has access to the medical history of the case and has reviewed the coroner's
report if required and if the death is due to natural causes. The individual
completing the cause-of-death section of the certificate shall attest to its
accuracy either by a signature or by approved electronic process.
C. A registered nurse referred to in Section
B above is a registered nurse who is employed by the attending hospice and may
complete and sign the medical certification of death and pronounce death for a
patient who is terminally if, whose death is anticipated, who is receiving
services from a hospice program certified under ACA §
20-7-117 and
who dies in a hospice inpatient program or as a hospice patient in a nursing
home.
Disclaimer: These regulations may not be the most recent version. Arkansas may have more current or accurate information. We make no warranties or guarantees about the accuracy, completeness, or adequacy of the information contained on this site or the information linked to on the state site. Please check official sources.
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