California psychologists have lost another fight to earn prescribing privileges. California Assembly Bill 1144 would have allowed the 10 psychologists who graduated from the Department of Defense’s pilot training program to prescribe psychoactive medications for persons aged 18 to 65. The military program was ended in 1996, and now AB 1144 has experienced the same fate.

Earlier in the year, AB 1144 was passed by the California Senate Business and Professions Committee, much to the disappointment of psychiatrists and lobbyists who had fought for years to prevent psychologists from prescribing medications to their patients. When the bill went before the Senate Appropriations Committee on August 7, however, it failed to pass on a 6-6-1 vote. The bill won reconsideration, however, and the Assembly scheduled hearings for later in the month, but the hearings were postponed multiple times and finally cancelled when the legislative term ended on August 31 without the hearings being held.

However, this may not be the last legislative effort to grant California psychologists prescribing privileges or the end of the battle by psychologists to gain prescribing privileges. According to the California Psychiatric Association’s government affairs director, Conni Barker, J.D., those supporting the bill promised that it would return.