The California Chapter of APNA is a statewide organization dedicated to serving the professional needs of APNA members throughout California.

Membership

Any APNA member who resides in California may become a member of the California Chapter. At present, there are no Chapter dues, so the procedure for California residents to join the Chapter is simple: just join APNA and then contact the Chapter to have your name and address added to our roster/mailing list. (Contacting the Chapter this way will avoid any delays in your name being added to our roster, so you will not miss out on any of our program notices or other mailings.)

The California Chapter engages in a wide range of activities which include: offering continuing education programs; letter-writing and lobbying to influence legislative issues that affect psychiatric / mental health nursing; forming strategic alliances with related organizations in the health-care field; leadership training; and facilitating opportunities for professionals in our field to network with one another.

Legislative Activities

The California Chapter has been active in legislative advocacy efforts since 1997. We've carried out letter-writing and phone-call campaigns supporting pending legislation on both the state and federal levels. And, during the past two years, we've begun emailing out our own Action Alerts to members on the CalAPNA list serve. (Most members are already on the list serve, but if you're not and you would like to be, please send an e-mail to rsherwood@calapna.org and asked to be added.) More recently, we created a new standing committee, the Legislative Committee, to manage this advocacy effort on a regular ongoing basis.

Issues for which we've advocated include: Medi-Cal and Medicare reimbursement of psychiatric APRNs, title protection for Clinical Nurse Specialists in California, increased funding for NIH, NIMH, NINR and the Health Professions and Nursing Education Programs in Title VII and VIII of the Public Health Services Act, safe nurse-patient ratios for freestanding psychiatric facilities in California, and insurance parity for mental health.

For more information, you can also visit http://www.calapna.org/.

EVENTS

May 1, 2010
APNA California Chapter Conference
Click here for more information.