Protocol · RN · New Mexico
Practice Protocol for Registered Nurses in New Mexico
Registered Nurses practice independently in New Mexico. A practice protocol is voluntary; here is what one covers and what the state does require.
RNs (general licensure, not an APRN) are not subject to physician-supervision or collaborative-agreement requirements in New Mexico; RN practice is defined and governed by the Nursing Practice Act (Ch. 61, Art. 3, NMSA) without a physician-oversight gate.
What a voluntary Registered Nurse protocol covers in New Mexico
New Mexico requires no written protocol for registered nurses. These are the clauses a practice includes when it chooses to put one in writing. The New Mexico Board of Nursing governs registered nurses here.
The Registered Nurse ("RN") shall practice under the orders, standing orders, or delegation of the Physician, consistent with the New Mexico Nursing Practice Act, NMSA Chapter 61, Article 3. New Mexico law does not require a supervision or collaboration agreement for this Registered Nurse's general scope of practice; the Physician shall instead be available to the Registered Nurse for consultation regarding clinical and patient care issues arising under any order or delegation.
- A voluntary protocol also carries 2 scope, 2 education and 2 registration clauses, authored in the document itself.
What New Mexico does require
The supervision and prescribing rules that apply to registered nurses regardless of any protocol.
Proximity
Not codified
Supervision ratio
Not codified — no cap on file
Chart review
Not codified
Meeting cadence
Not codified
Prescriptive authority
No agreement needed to prescribe · no controlled-substance authority
RNs do not have independent prescriptive authority in New Mexico; they administer medications only under a valid order from an authorized prescriber.
Written agreement
Not required
Unconditional — general RN licensure is never subject to physician supervision or a collaborative agreement, unlike the APRN/PA categories above.
Practice ownership (corporate practice of medicine)
Non-licensee ownership permitted — General RN licensure does not require formation of a same-profession professional corporation — an RN may own non-clinical businesses (staffing, home health, the MSO/business side of a med-spa) without the ownership restriction applicable to entities delivering physician/APRN-level clinical services.
For medical-aesthetics businesses performing procedures reserved to physicians/APRNs, RN ownership of the business entity does not itself confer authority to perform those procedures.
Sources for the supervision rules (1)
About New Mexico's rules
New Mexico has no corporate-practice-of-medicine doctrine (1987 A.G. opinion) — non-physician entities may employ physicians if clinical judgment isn't controlled — but professional corporations must still be single-profession owned (a PA/NP/etc. entity can't mix ownership with physicians). NP/CRNA/CNM/CNS practice independently with full prescriptive authority (Schedules II–V); PA remains the outlier requiring ongoing physician involvement.
Other clinicians in New Mexico: see the state overview.