What is a freestanding emergency medical care facility?

The Texas Freestanding Emergency Medical Care Facility (FEC) Licensing Act was first enacted in 2009 by the 81st Legislature. What is the definition of a freestanding emergency medical care facility?

Source: Texas Health & Human Services, Texas Department of State Health Services

A freestanding emergency medical care facility is a facility that is structurally separate and distinct from a hospital and which receives an individual and provides emergency care.

Emergency care is defined as health care services provided in a freestanding emergency medical care facility to evaluate and stabilize a medical condition of a recent onset and severity, including severe pain, psychiatric disturbances, or symptoms of substance abuse, that would lead a prudent layperson possessing an average knowledge of medicine and health to believe that the person’s condition, sickness, or injury is of such a nature that failure to get immediate medical care could result in:

placing the person’s health in serious jeopardy
serious impairment to bodily functions
serious dysfunction of a bodily organ or part
serious disfigurement
or in the case of a pregnant woman, serious jeopardy to the health of the woman or fetus

The Department develops rules that establish minimum standards for licensing procedures; for granting, denying, suspending, and revoking a license; for licensing fees; for operation; and for requirements concerning design, construction.

Licensing is a process: You can read more about what goes into securing licensing for a freestanding emergency care facility > Licensing