With the new Board of Vocational Nursing & Psychiatric Technicians (BVNPT) requirements for LVNs to re-submit Live Scan fingerprints, many nurses are realizing there is a hidden skeleton in their closet: an undisclosed DUI they thought couldn’t affect their career. They are now looking for answers about how to disclose the DUI and save their LVN license. That’s where RN Guardian can assist.
The BVNPT means it when they say that licensed practical nurses must disclose a DUI conviction to them in 30 days. Failure to do so is considered “Unprofessional Conduct” and while we have been able to get around this in the past, it appears the BVNPT is cracking down.
The BVNPT requires that you disclose the DUI within 30 days of being convicted. They do not want you to disclose it when you are arrested, because if you are Live Scan fingerprinted, they will already know. Since the BVNPT is requiring all nurses in California to submit or resubmit fingerprints if licensed prior to 2008, the BVNPT should be notified of every arrest within days. This creates a problem for nurses with old DUI convictions who never disclosed them to the BVNPT. The board is now going to see the conviction and they will be aware that you never disclosed it, even though you were required to do so. This is a violation of the Nurse Practice Act, is considered Unprofessional Conduct, and is potentially grounds for Revocation of your LVN license.
There are a few typical reasons that LVNs will not have disclosed a previous DUI conviction:
- You didn’t realize you were required to disclose the conviction.
- You didn’t disclose it properly and timely to the BVNPT.
The most common is the nurse didn’t realize that they HAD to. Up until just a few years ago, the BVNPT required disclosure of convictions upon renewal of the license every two years. If the LVN got the DUI, was convicted and had the DUI conviction expunged prior to renewal, they assumed that they did not have to disclose it. In fact, many nurses were told by their own DUI attorneys that they did not need to disclose it… which is true for most professions, but horribly inaccurate for a nurse’s purposes. One does not need to disclose an expunged DUI conviction to an employer, or on the vast majority of applications; the one critical exception for a nurse is the BVNPT. Convictions, expunged or not, have ALWAYS BEEN REQUIRED TO BE DISCLOSED. But of course, how would Joe DUI Lawyer know that? He wouldn’t.
If you are in the position where you are being required to submit or resubmit Live Scan fingerprints to renew your LVN license and you have an old conviction to disclose, PLEASE give us a call or fill out the form below.
Not only are you going to have to disclose the DUI at this point, but you are going to need to provide a very convincing argument regarding why you failed to do so previously. If you begin the process 60 days prior to renewal, your LVN license should be renewed without a lapse. If not, you may be dealing with an inactive license for a time, unable to work.
In many, many cases, the BVNPT has been issuing a citation and fine for the previous failure to disclose and the accompanying Unprofessional Conduct. However, in some cases, it has given rise to investigations and potential Accusations against your LVN license. (Learn more about Accusations, here. In short… you REALLY want to avoid them.)
This new Live Scan trend is unfortunate, because for many of these cases, the nurse is a great employee who did all of the right things at the time of the conviction. Does this sound familiar?
- The DUI is over 10 years old
- It doesn’t show up on background checks
- It doesn’t show up with the DMV
- It doesn’t affect your insurance
- It’s basically undiscoverable, or so you thought
These are all cases where the BVNPT may have cause to file an Accusation. Having an Accusation filed means that the BVNPT essentially drags that dusty old skeleton out of your closet and attaches it like an albatross around your LVN license for the rest of your career. It is not something to take lightly and I do not recommend you try to handle it on your own. We have handled hundreds and hundreds of disclosures for our clients and for our RN Guardian members, we offer them for a dependable flat fee.
Contact our team today to get your LVN renewal taken care of with the least impact to your livelihood and career.