Practice Agreement · NP

Nurse Practitioner Practice Agreement in Utah

Utah law does not require a Nurse Practitioner to hold a named agreement with a physician. Practices still use one to define the working relationship; here is what it covers and what the state does require.

Practice authorityIndependent practice
Written agreementNo agreement required
What Utah calls itNo instrument required
Governing boardUtah Board of Nursing and the Utah Board of Pharmacy
Research date2026-09-03 · clauses 2026-09-03

S.B. 36 (2023) eliminated the state-mandated physician contract as a condition of NP licensure — Utah became the 27th full-practice-authority state. NPs are not limited in any of the four elements of APRN practice (diagnose, treat, prescribe, refer) and need no collaborating-physician agreement.

What a Nurse Practitioner practice agreement covers in Utah

Governed by the Utah Board of Nursing and the Utah Board of Pharmacy. Each numbered item is a statutory requirement the agreement must satisfy.

  1. Utah does not require the Nurse Practitioner to enter into a supervision or collaboration agreement with a physician for licensure, scope of practice, or prescribing, including controlled substances, following Senate Bill 36 (2023), which eliminated the former mandatory consultation and referral plan under Utah Code § 58-31b-101 et seq. The Nurse Practitioner practices under the Nurse Practitioner's own license, consistent with Utah Code § 58-31b-803.

  2. This Agreement's terms regarding the Nurse Practitioner accordingly serve to define the working relationship, referral pathways, and any Medical Director oversight between the Parties, and are not themselves required by Utah law as a condition of the Nurse Practitioner's authority to practice.

  3. The agreement on file also carries 1 scope, 1 education, 1 registration clauses, generated in the document itself.

Statutes and rules cited

  1. Utah Code § 58-17b-102statute

    Defines "collaborative pharmacy practice" and "collaborative pharmacy practice agreement" and includes collaborative pharmacy practice, drug therapy management, and therapy initiation within the practice of pharmacy.

Terms it has to carry

Ratio, proximity, chart review, meeting and prescribing terms the agreement has to carry, from the state's supervision rules.

Proximity

No proximity requirement

No supervising/collaborating physician relationship exists post-S.B. 36 — proximity is not applicable.

Supervision ratio

Not codified — no cap on file

Chart review

Not codified — left to the agreement

Meeting cadence

Not codified — left to the agreement

Prescriptive authority

Covered by the practice agreement · controlled substances permitted

NPs prescribe Schedule II-V controlled substances under their own Utah Controlled Substance License and DEA registration, with no agreement-based gating post-S.B. 36.

Written agreement

Not required

Unconditional since S.B. 36 (2023) — no collaborating-physician contract or agreement of any kind is required for NP licensure or practice in Utah.

Practice ownership (corporate practice of medicine)

Licensee-only ownership required — Professional Corporation (Title 16, Ch. 11) or Professional LLC (§ 48-3a-1106) — an NP may independently own a single-profession nursing PC/PLLC; non-licensees may not hold equity.

Full practice authority under S.B. 36 makes NP ownership straightforward relative to states requiring physician co-ownership.

Legal sources for these rules (3)
How the relationship works day to day
Who has to be where, how often you meet, and what the physician costs: Nurse Practitioner in Utah on collaborativeagreement.com.

About Utah's rules

S.B. 36 (2023) eliminated the physician-collaboration/contract requirement for ALL APRN roles (NP, CRNA, CNM, CNS), not just NPs — Utah is a full-independence state across the APRN scope. PAs remain on a separate, hours-tiered collaboration model (Utah Code § 58-70a-307) with no numeric ratio cap or chart-review percentage codified.

Other clinicians in Utah: see the state overview.