The Texas Board of Nursing oversees all nursing regulations in the state of Texas. The mission of the board is to establish guidelines that protect the health of Texans by ensuring every person holding a license in the state is competent to practice nursing in Texas.
The board oversees 114 nursing education programs for registered nurses and 98 for vocational nurses. They also oversee the status of 260,000 licensed registered nurses and 98,000 licensed vocational nurses. They are an important organization for anyone entering a nursing degree program in Texas.
The Lone Star State employs the second highest number of nurses in the country. Both the Dallas and Houston metro areas rank in the Top 10 metro areas for the employment of nurses. Texas is the only state to have two cities on the list from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
The Texas Board of Nursing’s Mission
The Texas Board of Nursing operates under the guidance of the Nursing Practice Act. The state Legislature can alter the act when it meets every other year.
The lengthy act lays out how the Texas Board of Nursing monitors people in the state. This includes the issuance of regulation and guidelines for nursing degree programs, licensure for nurses and other issues.
Registered Nurse Scope of Practice
The Texas Board of Nursing has a detailed scope of practice for those who work in nursing in Texas. They include the following activities RNs are authorized to perform:
- Observation, assessment, intervention, evaluation, rehabilitation, care and counsel, or health teachings of a person who is ill, injured, infirm, or experiencing a change in normal health processes
- maintenance of health or prevention of illness
- Administration of a medication or treatment as ordered by a physician, podiatrist, or dentist
- Supervision or teaching of nursing
- Administration, supervision, and evaluation of nursing practices, policies, and procedures
- Requesting, receiving, signing for, and distribution of prescription drug samples to patients at practices at which an advanced practice registered nurse is authorized to sign prescription drug orders
- Performance of an act delegated by a physician
- Development of the nursing care plan.
Conduct With Public
Nursing is a highly regulated position. The act gets into almost every detail of the profession, which is why it is required reading for nurses in Texas. The act also details actions that can be taken against nurses for violating codes of conduct or any other aspect of the nursing act. For those entering a degree program in nursing, it’s important to read the rules and regulations as laid out by the Texas Board of Nursing and the Nursing Practice Act.