A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT exempting isolation float tanks from public swimming pool laws and clarifying that licensed physical therapists are authorized to prescribe the use of isolation float tanks in the course of physical therapy.
The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:
SECTION 1.  G.S. 130A‑280 reads as rewritten:
"§ 130A‑280.  Scope.
This Article provides for the regulation of public swimming pools in the State as they may affect the public health and safety. As used in this Article, the term "public swimming pool" means any structure, chamber, or tank containing an artificial body of water used by the public for swimming, diving, wading, recreation, or therapy, together with buildings, appurtenances, and equipment used in connection with the body of water, regardless of whether a fee is charged for its use. The term includes municipal, school, hotel, motel, apartment, boarding house, athletic club, or other membership facility pools and spas. This Article does not apply to a private pool serving a single family dwelling and used only by the residents of the dwelling and their guests. This Article also does not apply to therapeutic pools, including isolation float tanks, used in physical therapy programs operated by medical facilities licensed by the Department or operated or owned by a licensed physical therapist, nor to therapeutic chambers drained, cleaned, and refilled after each individual use."
SECTION 2.  G.S. 90‑270.24(4) reads as rewritten:
"(4)	"Physical therapy" means the evaluation or treatment of any person by the use of physical, chemical, or other properties of heat, light, water, electricity, sound, massage, or therapeutic exercise, or other rehabilitative procedures, with or without assistive devices, for the purposes of preventing, correcting, or alleviating a physical or mental disability. Physical therapy includes the performance of specialized tests of neuromuscular function, administration of specialized therapeutic procedures, interpretation and implementation of referrals from licensed medical doctors or dentists, and establishment and modification of physical therapy programs for patients, including programs prescribed solely at the discretion of the physical therapist that involve the use of isolation float tanks. Evaluation and treatment of patients may involve physical measures, methods, or procedures as are found commensurate with physical therapy education and training and generally or specifically authorized by regulations of the Board. Physical therapy education and training shall include study of the skeletal manifestations of systemic disease. Physical therapy does not include the application of roentgen rays or radioactive materials, surgery, manipulation of the spine unless prescribed by a physician licensed to practice medicine in North Carolina, or medical diagnosis of disease."
SECTION 3.  This act is effective when it becomes law.