Section 481.62.1. Definitions.

For the purposes of these rules, the following terms shall have the meaning indicated in this chapter. The definitions set out in Iowa Code section 135C.1 shall be considered incorporated verbatim in the rules. The use of the words “shall” and “must” indicate these standards are mandatory.

“Academic services” means those activities provided to assist a person to acquire general information and skills which establish the basis for subsequent acquisition and application of knowledge.

“Age appropriate” means those activities, settings, and personal appearance and possessions commensurate with the person’s chronological age.

“Chronic mental illness” means a persistent mental or emotional disorder that seriously impairs an adult’s functioning relative to such primary aspects of daily living as personal relations, living arrangements, or employment.

“Commission” means the mental health and mental retardation commission.

“Community living training services” are those activities provided to assist a person to acquire or sustain the knowledge and skills essential to independent functioning to the person’s maximum potential in the physical and social environment. These services may focus on the following areas:

            1.      Independent living skills means those skills necessary to sustain oneself in the physical environment and are essential to the management of one’s personal property and business. This includes self-advocacy skills.

            2.      Socialization skills which include self-awareness and self-control, social responsiveness, group participation, social amenities, and interpersonal skills.

            3.      Communication skills which include expressive and receptive skills in verbal and nonverbal language including reading and writing.

            4.      Leisure time and recreational skills which include the skills necessary for a person to use leisure time in a manner which is satisfying and constructive to the person.

            5.      Parenting skills which include those skills necessary to meet the needs of the person’s child. This service is designed to assist the person with mental illness to acquire or sustain the skills necessary for parenting.

“Department” means the Iowa department of inspections and appeals.

“Dependent adult abuse” is as defined in rule 481—52.1(235E).

“Diagnosis” means the investigation and analysis of the cause or nature of a person’s condition, situation, or problem.

“Direct care staff” means those staff persons who provide a homelike environment for the residents and assist or supervise the resident in meeting the goals in the resident’s program plan.

“Evaluation services” means those activities designed to identify a person’s current functioning level and those factors which are barriers to maintaining the current level or achieving a higher level of functioning.

“Exploitation” means the act or process of taking unfair advantage of a resident, or the resident’s physical or financial resources, for one’s own personal or pecuniary profit by the use of undue influence, harassment, duress, deception, false representation, or false pretenses.

“Goals” means general statements of attainable expected accomplishments to be achieved in meeting identified needs.

“Incident” means all accidental, purposeful, or other occurrences within the facility or on the premises affecting residents, visitors, or employees whether there is apparent injury or where hidden injury may have occurred.

“Individual program plan (IPP)” means a written plan for the provision of services to the resident that is developed and implemented using an interdisciplinary process, that is based on the resident’s functional status, strengths and needs, and that identifies service activities designed to enable a person to maintain or move toward independent functioning. The plan identifies a continuum of development and outlines progressive steps and anticipated outcomes of services.

“Informed consent” means an agreement by a person, or by the person’s legally authorized representative, based upon an understanding of:

            1.      A full explanation of the procedures to be followed including an identification of those that are and are not experimental,

            2.      A description of the attendant discomforts, risks, and benefits to be expected,

            3.      A disclosure of appropriate alternative procedures that would be advantageous for the person.

“Interdisciplinary process” means an approach to assessment, individual program planning, and service implementation in which planning participants function as a team. Each participant utilizing the skills, competencies, insights and perspectives provided by the participant’s training and experience focuses on identifying the service needs of the resident and the resident’s family. The purpose of the process is for participants to review and discuss, face-to-face, all information and recommendations and to reach decisions as a team. Participants share all information and recommendations, and develop as a team a single, integrated, individual program plan to meet the resident’s and, when appropriate, the resident’s family’s needs.

“Interdisciplinary team” means the group of persons who develop a single, integrated, individual program plan to meet a resident’s needs for services. The interdisciplinary team consists of, at a minimum, the resident, the resident’s legal guardian, if applicable, the resident’s advocate if desired by the resident, a referral agency representative, other appropriate staff members, other providers of services, and other persons relevant to resident’s needs.

“Least restrictive environment” means the environment in which the interventions in the lives of people with mental illness can be carried out with a minimum of limitation, intrusion, disruption, and departure from commonly accepted patterns of living.

It is the environment which allows residents to participate, to the maximum extent possible, in everyday life and to have control over the decisions that affect them. It is an environment that provides needed supports which do not interfere with personal liberty and do not unduly interfere with a person’s access to the normal events of life.

“Legal services” means those activities designed to assist the person in exercising constitutional and legislatively enacted rights.

“Level of functioning” means a person’s current physiological and psychological status and current academic, community living, self-care, and vocational skills.

“Long-term residential care facility for persons with mental illness (RCF/PMI)” means a residential setting to maintain or improve community living skills to reach maximum potential for independent living and to prevent movement to a more restrictive setting.

“Mechanical restraint” means a device applied to a person’s limbs, head, or body which restricts a person’s movement and includes but is not limited to leather straps, leather cuffs, camisoles, or handcuffs.

“Mental abuse” means, but is not limited to, humiliation, harassment, and threats of punishment or deprivation.

“Mental illness” means a substantial disorder of thought or mood which significantly impairs judgment, behavior, or the capacity to recognize reality or the ability to cope with the ordinary demands of life. Mental disorders include the organic and functional psychoses, neuroses, personality disorders, alcoholism and drug dependence, behavioral disorders and other disorders as defined by the current edition of American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

“Normalization” means helping persons, in accordance with their needs and preference, to achieve a lifestyle that is consistent with the norms and patterns of general society and in ways which incorporate the age-appropriate and least restrictive principles.

“Objectives” means specific, time-limited, and measurable statements showing outcomes or accomplishments necessary to progress toward the goal.

“Physical abuse” means, but is not limited to, corporal punishment and the use of restraints as punishment.

“Physical injury” means damage to any bodily tissue to the extent the tissue must undergo a healing process in order to be restored to a sound and healthy condition. It may also mean damage to the extent the bodily tissue cannot be restored to a sound and healthy condition, or results in the death of the resident whose bodily tissue sustained the damage.

“Physical or physiological treatment” means those activities designed to prevent, halt, control, relieve, or reverse symptoms or conditions which interfere with the physical or physiological functioning of the human body.

“Physical restraint” means a technique involving the use of one or more of a staff person’s arms, legs, hands or other body areas to restrict or control the movements of a resident. This does not include the use of mechanical restraint.

“Physician” means a person licensed to practice medicine and surgery, osteopathy and surgery, osteopathy, or chiropractic under the laws of this state; but a physician licensed as a physician and surgeon shall be designated as a “physician” or “surgeon”; a person licensed as an osteopath and surgeon shall be designated as an “osteopathic physician” or “osteopathic surgeon”; a person designated as an osteopath shall be designated as an “osteopathic physician”; and a person licensed as a chiropractor shall be designated as a “chiropractor.”

“Primary care provider” means any of the following who provide primary care and meet certification standards:

            1.      A physician who is a family or general practitioner or an internist.

            2.      An advanced registered nurse practitioner.

            3.      A physician assistant.

“Program” means a set of related resources and services directed to the accomplishment of a fixed set of goals and objectives for any of the following:

            1.      Special target populations,

            2.      The population of a specified geographic area(s),

            3.      A specified purpose, and

            4.      A person.

“Psychotherapeutic treatment” means those activities designed to assist a person in the identification or modification of beliefs, emotions, attitudes, or behaviors in order to maintain or improve the person’s functioning in response to the physical, emotional and social environment.

“Qualified mental health professional (QMHP)” means a person who:

Is a psychiatrist, psychologist, social worker, psychiatric nurse or mental health counselor; or

Is a doctor of medicine or osteopathic medicine or has at least a master’s degree or its equivalent with coursework focusing on diagnosis and evaluation and psychotherapeutic treatment of mental health problems and mental illness.

Equivalent means at least 32 semester hours of graduate level study in the following areas:

            1.      Psychology (normal and abnormal)

            2.      Assessment (psychological and physiological)

            3.      Growth, development, and personality

            4.      Learning theory

            5.      Counseling theory and technique (group dynamics)

            6.      Human behavior

            7.      Sociology

            8.      Interpersonal relations

            9.      Change

            10.     Systems theory

            11.     Interdisciplinary team process

            12.     Organizational theory

            13.     Planning

These persons must have two years of documented supervised experience in providing mental health services; or

Is employed by a community mental health center or mental health service provider accredited by the commission and has less than a master’s degree but at least a bachelor’s degree and sufficient education and experience as determined by the chief administrative officer of the community mental health center, with the approval of the commission with coursework and experience focusing on diagnosis and evaluation and treatment of persons with mental health problems and mental illness.

All persons must hold a current license when required by Iowa law.

            1.       “Psychiatrist” means a doctor of medicine or osteopathic medicine and surgery who is certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology or who is eligible for certification.

            2.       “Psychologist” means a person who is licensed to practice psychology in the state of Iowa, or is certified by the Iowa department of education as a school psychologist, or is eligible for certification, or meets the requirements for eligibility for a license to practice psychology in the state of Iowa that were effective prior to July 1, 1985.

            3.       “Social worker” means a person who is licensed to practice social work in the state of Iowa, or who is eligible for licensure.

            4.       “Psychiatric nurse” means a person who meets the requirements of certified psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner pursuant to 655—Chapter 7, Iowa Administrative Code, or is eligible for certification.

            5.       “Mental health counselor” means a person who is certified or eligible for certification as a mental health counselor by the National Academy of Certified Clinical Mental Health Counselors.

“Resident” means a person who has been admitted to the facility to receive care and services.

“Seclusion” means the isolation of the resident in a locked room which cannot be opened by the resident.

“Self-care training services” means those activities provided to assist a person to acquire or sustain the knowledge, habits, and skills essential to the daily needs of the person. The activities focus on personal hygiene, general health maintenance, mobility skills, and other activities of daily living.

“Service” means a set of interrelated activities provided to a resident pursuant to the IPP.

“Sexual abuse” means, but is not limited to, the exposing of pubes to a resident, the exposure of a resident’s genitals, pubes, breasts or buttocks for sexual satisfaction, fondling or touching the inner thigh, groin, buttocks, anus or breast of a resident or the clothing covering these areas, sexually suggestive comments or remarks made to a resident, a genital to genital or oral to genital contact or the commission of a sexual offense under Iowa Code chapter 709 or Iowa Code section 726.2.

“Short-term transitional residential care facility for persons with mental illness” means a transitional setting to move the person toward independent living by helping the person gain mastery of independent living skills.

“Support services” means those activities provided to or on behalf of a person in the areas of personal care and assistance and property maintenance in order to allow a person to live in the least restrictive environment.

“Transportation services” means those activities designed to assist a person to travel from one place to another to obtain services or carry out life’s activities.

“Verbal abuse” means, but is not limited to, the use of derogatory terms or names, undue voice volume and rude comments, orders, or responses to residents.

“Vocational training services” means those activities designed to familiarize a person with production or employment requirements and to maintain or develop the person’s ability to function in a work setting. This service includes programming which allows or promotes the development of skills, attitudes, and personal attributes appropriate to the work setting.

“Work” means any activity during which a resident provides goods or services for wages.

“Written, in writing or recorded” means that an account or entry is made in a permanent form.

[ARC 1204C, IAB 12/11/13, effective 1/15/14; ARC 1752C, IAB 12/10/14, effective 1/14/15]