SB 1002, as introduced, Monning. End of Life Option Act: telephone number.
The End of Life Option Act, as enacted in the 2015-16 Second Extraordinary Session of the Legislature, authorizes, until January 1, 2026, an adult who meets certain qualifications, and who has been determined by his or her attending physician to be suffering from a terminal disease, as defined, to make a request for a drug prescribed pursuant to the act for the purpose of ending his or her life through self-administration of the drug. The act establishes certain procedures for making a request, prohibits certain agreements or policies from being conditioned upon or affected by a request, and provides immunity from civil or criminal liability, with exceptions, to persons present when the qualified individual self-administers the drug or to persons preparing the drug. The act provides that action taken in accordance with the act shall not constitute, among other things, suicide or homicide.
The act requires physicians to submit specified forms and information to the State Department of Public Health after writing a prescription for an aid-in-dying drug and after the death of an individual who requested an aid-in-dying drug. The act authorizes the Medical Board of California to update those forms. The act requires the State Department of Public Health to publish the forms on its Internet Web site, collect and review certain information, annually create a statistical report of the information collected, as specified, and post that report on its Internet Web site.
This bill would require the department to establish and maintain a toll-free telephone number for the purpose of receiving and responding to inquiries regarding the End of Life Option Act, and post the telephone number on the department’s Internet Web site. This bill would require the telephone number to operate during the regular business hours of the department and be available to the public.
Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.
The people of the State of California do enact as follows:
Section 443.19 of the Health and Safety Code,
2as added by Section 1 of Chapter 1 of the Statutes of 2015, Second
3Extraordinary Session, is amended to read:
(a) The State Department of Public Health shall collect
5and review the information submitted pursuant to Section 443.9.
6The information collected shall be confidential and shall be
7collected in a manner that protects the privacy of the patient, the
8patient’s family, and any medical provider or pharmacist involved
9with the patient under the provisions of this part. The information
10shall not be disclosed, discoverable, or compelled to be produced
11in any civil, criminal, administrative, or other proceeding.
12(b) On or before July 1, 2017, and each year thereafter, based
13on the information collected in the previous year, the department
14shall create a report with the information collected from the
15attending physician followup form and post that report
to its
16Internet Web site. The report shall include, but not be limited to,
17all of the following based on the information that is provided to
18the department and on the department’s access to vital statistics:
19(1) The number of people for whom an aid-in-dying prescription
20was written.
21(2) The number of known individuals who died each year for
22whom aid-in-dying prescriptions were written, and the cause of
23death of those individuals.
24(3) For the period commencing January 1, 2016, to and including
25the previous year, cumulatively, the total number of aid-in-dying
26prescriptions written, the number of people who died due to use
P3 1of aid-in-dying drugs, and the number of those people who died
2who were enrolled in hospice or other palliative care programs at
3the time of death.
4(4) The number of known deaths in California from using
5aid-in-dying drugs per 10,000 deaths in California.
6(5) The number of physicians who wrote prescriptions for
7aid-in-dying drugs.
8(6) Of people who died due to using an aid-in-dying drug,
9demographic percentages organized by the following
10characteristics:
11(A) Age at death.
12(B) Education level.
13(C) Race.
14(D) Sex.
15(E) Type of insurance, including whether or not they had
16insurance.
17(F) Underlying illness.
18(c) The State Department of Public Health shall make available
19the attending physician checklist and compliance form, the
20consulting physician compliance form, and the attending physician
21followup form, as described in Section 443.22, by posting them
22on its Internet Web site.
23(d) The State Department of Public Health shall establish and
24maintain a toll-free telephone number for the purpose of receiving
25and responding to inquiries regarding the End of Life Option Act.
26The department shall post the telephone number on its Internet
27Web site. The telephone number shall operate during the regular
28business hours of the department and be available to the public.
O
99