Chapter 286
2013 -- H 5749
Enacted 07/15/13
A N A C T
RELATING TO
HUMAN SERVICES -- ABUSED AND NEGLECTED CHILDREN
Introduced
By: Representatives Naughton, Ackerman,
Silva, Bennett, and
Date Introduced: February 28, 2013
It is enacted by the
General Assembly as follows:
SECTION 1. Section 40-11-3 of the General Laws in Chapter
40-11 entitled "Abused and
Neglected Children" is
hereby amended to read as follows:
40-11-3.
Duty to report -- Deprivation of nutrition or medical treatment.
-- (a) Any
person who has reasonable cause to know or suspect that any
child has been abused or neglected
as defined in section 40-11-2 or has been a victim of
sexual abuse by another child shall, within
twenty-four (24) hours, transfer that information to the
department of children, youth and families
or its agent who shall cause the report to be
investigated immediately. As a result of those reports
and referrals, protective social services shall be made
available to those children in an effort to
safeguard and enhance the welfare of those children and to
provide a means to prevent further
abuse or neglect. The department shall establish and
implement a single, statewide, toll-free
telephone to operate twenty-four (24) hours per day, seven (7)
days per week for the receipt of
reports concerning child abuse and neglect, which reports
shall be electronically recorded and
placed in the central registry established by section
42-72-7. The electronically recorded records,
properly indexed by date and other essential identifying data,
shall be maintained for a minimum
of three (3) years; provided, however, any person who
has been reported for child abuse and/or
neglect and who has been determined not to have neglected
and/or abused a child, shall have his
or her record expunged as to that incident three (3)
years after that determination. The department
shall establish rules and regulations requiring
hospitals, health care centers, emergency rooms and
other appropriate health facilities to report on a
quarterly basis the number of cases reported by
these institutions as suspected child abuse continuously maintain a management information
database which includes all of the information required to
implement this section, including the
number of cases reported by hospitals, health care centers,
emergency rooms and other
appropriate health care facilities.
(b) The reporting shall
include immediate notification of the department of any instance
where parents of an infant have requested deprivation of
nutrition that is necessary to sustain life
and/or who have requested deprivation of medical or surgical
intervention that is necessary to
remedy or ameliorate a life threatening medical condition,
if the nutrition or medical or surgical
intervention is generally provided to similar nutritional,
medical, or surgical conditioned infants,
whether disabled or not.
(c) Nothing in this
section shall be interpreted to prevent a child's parents and physician
from discontinuing the use of life-support systems or nonpalliative treatment for a child who is
terminally ill where, in the opinion of the child's physician
exercising competent medical
judgment, the child has no reasonable chance of recovery from
the terminal illness despite every
appropriate medical treatment to correct the condition.
SECTION 2. This act shall take effect upon passage.
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LC01428
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