Prescriptive Authority

prescription being handed from health care professional to patient

Supporting the efforts of state, provincial, and territorial psychological associations to obtain the authority for licensed psychologists to write prescriptions.

Our focus

Advocate for prescribing rights for qualified psychologists.
APA Services supports the efforts of our state, provincial, and territorial psychological association partners to obtain prescriptive authority for licensed psychologists with specialized training to help fill the need for access to comprehensive, quality mental health care.
Support prescriptive authority legislation to psychologists with additional education and training in clinical psychopharmacology.
Explore and embrace new approaches to ensuring that people get the healthcare they need and deserve, particularly given the crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our efforts on this issue advance the following advocacy priorities:

Health promotion and prevention throughout lifespan and settings
Access to health services, including mental and behavioral health services
Reimbursement and scope of practice

As psychologists there is something that all of us can do, whether it’s at the local, regional, state or federal level.
—Manuel Paris Jr., PsyD, Associate professor, Yale University

What you can do

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Related issues

Contact us

Deborah Baker, JD
Head, Office of Professional Legal and Regulatory Affairs

Conwell Smith
Deputy Chief, Military and Veterans Policy

Email the Office of Professional Legal and Regulatory Affairsopens in new window

Email APA Advocacy Office

Recent advocacy on prescriptive authority

APA Services welcomes five new members to the Advocacy Coordinating Committee

November 4, 2025

APA Services welcomes five new members to its Advocacy Coordinating Committee, which guides the association’s advocacy priorities each year. Meet the new appointees shaping psychology’s voice in public policy

Advocating for prescribing psychologists

September 26, 2025

APA Services responds to proposed rules in Colorado concerning written physician preapprovals

A teenager girl using her laptop to have a video call with a mental health specialist

Urging policymakers to preserve telemental health access

March 18, 2025

APA Services responds to proposed rule concerning a special DEA registration process to prescribe medications via telehealth

Senior man sitting on sofa and having video call with his doctor

Continued access to telemental health prescriptions

December 10, 2024

The Biden administration extends the current rules on prescribing via telehealth for an additional year

More on prescriptive authority

About prescribing psychologists

Allowing prescribing rights for psychologists is an essential step to providing thousands of patients with access to comprehensive mental health care.

RxP: A chronology

A chronological history of prescriptive authority (RxP) in the United States.

Legislative action

APA Services supports Washington State prescriptive authority legislation (PDF, 265KB) opens in new window

HB 1041 would grant prescriptive authority to psychologists with specialized education and training in clinical psychopharmacology.

APA Policy

APA Model legislation for prescriptive authority (PDF, 68KB) opens in new window

APA Services supports the efforts to obtain prescriptive authority for qualified, licensed psychologists to help fill the need for access to comprehensive, quality mental health care.

APA Policy

Model education and training program in psychopharmacology for prescriptive authority (PDF, 156KB)

Psychology's ethical responsibility requires that the profession be able to define the training needs and minimum competencies required for prescriptive authority.