CNS · Arizona
Supervision Agreement for Clinical Nurse Specialists in Arizona
No. Clinical Nurse Specialists practice independently here. Arizona does not require one.
No individual supervising-physician agreement is required — A.R.S. § 32-1651 instead confines CNS prescribing to licensed institutions where employed (hospitals, behavioral health facilities, hospice, etc.), with Schedule II opioid prescribing gated by institutional protocol developed with medical director input, not a personal collaborating physician.
What the supervision must look like
The rules the physician relationship has to follow. Each fact comes from the statute or board rule listed under sources.
Proximity
Not codified — left to the agreement
Supervision ratio
Not codified — no cap on file
Chart review
Not codified — left to the agreement
Meeting cadence
Not codified — left to the agreement
Prescriptive authority
Separate prescribing terms required · controlled substances permitted
The 'separate agreement' here is the institutional protocol itself, not a standing individual physician agreement.
Written agreement
Not required
No individual physician agreement is required, but CNS prescribing is structurally confined to institutional employment with medical-director-developed protocols — a scope constraint rather than a supervision requirement, and prescribing outside a licensed institution is not authorized at all.
Practice ownership (corporate practice of medicine)
Non-licensee ownership permitted — Same A.R.S. § 10-3301 framework — no numeric ownership cap confirmed in the primary text located. CNS practice is institution-based by statute in any case (see independentPractice.notes), which limits how much this ownership question arises in practice.
Legal sources for these rules (1)
What a supervising physician costs here
Typical monthly cost in Arizona
$500 – $600
Estimate for one Clinical Nurse Specialist. Standard-tier state.
About Arizona's rules
Arizona has no explicit statutory CPOM ban; existing doctrine comes only from two optometry cases never applied to physician/PA ownership, making MSO tolerance a reasonable inference rather than a confirmed rule. NP/CNM/PMHNP have FULL practice authority with no collaborative agreement. PA's 2024 reform (A.R.S. Title 32 Ch. 25) removes the written agreement at 8,000 hours but still requires a designated collaborating physician/entity.
Other clinicians in Arizona: see the state overview.