This provision defines which people count as osteopathic physicians and limits what licensed osteopathic physicians may do, including surgery and prescribing drugs.
(1) For purposes of the Uniform Credentialing Act, the following classes of persons shall be deemed to be engaged in practice as osteopathic physicians: (a) Persons publicly professing to be osteopathic physicians or publicly professing to assume the duties incident to the practice of osteopathic physicians; and (b) Persons who are graduates of a school or college of osteopathic medicine and who treat human ailments by that system of the healing art which was advocated and taught by the school or college of osteopathic medicine from which such person graduated at the time of his or her graduation as determined by the department, with the recommendation of the board. (2) No license issued to osteopathic physicians under the Medicine and Surgery Practice Act shall authorize the person so licensed to perform surgical procedures except those usually performed by general practitioners, as determined by the department, with the recommendation of the board. (3) Nothing in this section shall be construed to prohibit an osteopathic physician licensed in accordance with the act from serving as an assistant in surgery more complex than that usually performed by general practitioners, as determined by the department, with the recommendation of the board, when such surgery is performed by an osteopathic physician licensed pursuant to section 38-2032 or by an osteopathic physician or doctor of medicine licensed pursuant to section 38-2026. In no event shall this section or section 38-2032 be construed as authorizing any physician to engage in any procedure which he or she is not qualified by training to perform according to the standards prevailing in the State of Nebraska at the time. (4) Persons who are licensed to practice as osteopathic physicians who have demonstrated to the department, with the recommendation of the board, that they have acquired adequate training and knowledge for such purpose and have been so authorized by the department, with the recommendation of the board, may prescribe and administer drugs and medicines. History: Laws 1927, c. 167, § 115, p. 488; C.S.1929, § 71-1701; R.S.1943, § 71-1,137; Laws 1969, c. 565, § 1, p. 2299; Laws 1972, LB 1498, § 2; Laws 1981, LB 451, § 9; Laws 1989, LB 342, § 21; Laws 1996, LB 1044, § 442; Laws 1999, LB 828, § 103; R.S.1943, (2003), § 71-1,137; Laws 2007, LB463, § 687.