Approximately 75,000 Texas physicians seeking to renew their medical license soon will be required to submit their fingerprints, according to the Texas Medical Board (TMB).
The requirement stems in part from a new law, passed by the 2023 Texas Legislature, that mandates the submission of fingerprints for medical license applicants, among other provisions. The law also requires license holders who have not previously submitted their fingerprints to do so as part of their next registration renewal process.
TMB President Sherif Zaafran, MD, emphasizes that once a licensee submits fingerprints, he or she will not have to do so at subsequent renewals.
“This is a one-time event,” he told Texas Medicine Today.
Although the law provides an exception to new fingerprinting requirements for licensees who previously submitted fingerprints as part of a license application, the TMB website states existing physicians who were fingerprinted upon initial licensure prior to Jan. 15, 2018 will have to be fingerprinted again. These physicians are not yet part of the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Civil Rap Back system, which allows for continuous vetting of individuals’ national criminal history.
TMB will begin this process with licenses set to expire in February 2024; instructions will be included in the email renewal notices that go out in December.
Given the volume of licenses impacted, Dr. Zaafran said TMB is “just asking everyone to bear with us through this process.”
Physicians who were fingerprinted as part of the initial licensure process after Jan. 15, 2018, already are enrolled in the FBI Civil Rap Back system and therefore aren’t affected by this provision of the law.
For more information, check out the TMB website.
Last Updated On
November 15, 2023
Originally Published On
November 15, 2023
Emma Freer
Associate Editor
(512) 370-1383