GLP-1 Weight Loss Telehealth in Kansas

Kansas is home to roughly 2.9 million people, and about 35.7% of Kansas adults have obesity. Whether treatment is appropriate for any individual is a licensed physician's decision.

Whether you live in Wichita, Overland Park, Kansas City or anywhere else in Kansas, you can start with an online medical assessment once we open, and a physician licensed in Kansas reviews it and decides whether telehealth treatment is right for you.

Kansas telehealth rules: Kansas allows licensed physicians to prescribe non-controlled medications via telehealth, including compounded GLP-1 medications dispensed by state-licensed pharmacies.

If you are in Kansas for the visit. K.S.A. 65-28,135(a) is written for treating "patients located in the state of Kansas," so tell the clinician where you are physically located during the visit; if you travel or move, see telehealth when you travel or cross state lines. For a physician, ask which Kansas license or telemedicine waiver covers the visit, and contact the Kansas State Board of Healing Arts to confirm it. A physician licensed in another state can treat you by telemedicine if the physician receives a Kansas telemedicine waiver; a license from another state is not by itself that waiver. For other healthcare professionals, such as physician assistants or nurse practitioners, ask which Kansas license or authorization covers your visit; subsection (g) leaves telemedicine procedures for other professions to their own Kansas licensing agency.

How the visit works. Telemedicine "may be used to establish a valid provider-patient relationship," and the same standards of practice and conduct, and the same federal privacy and confidentiality requirements, apply as for in-person care (K.S.A. 40-2,212(a) through (c)). A physician practicing telemedicine under K.S.A. 65-28,135 must "conduct an appropriate assessment and evaluation of the patient's current condition and document the appropriate medical indication for any prescription issued." To get ready, see how to prepare for your first telehealth visit.

After the visit. The clinician must give you guidance on appropriate follow-up care. If you consent and have a primary care or other treating physician, a report of the treatment and services must go to that physician within three business days, unless another law prohibits it; professionals authorized to practice by the behavioral sciences regulatory board are exempt from that report rule (K.S.A. 40-2,212(d)).

Kansas keeps its telehealth law in two places, and it helps to read them together. The first is the Kansas telemedicine act, K.S.A. 40-2,210 through 40-2,216, which took effect January 1, 2019 and sets the rules of the visit itself. The second is K.S.A. 65-28,135, added in 2021, which answers the licensing question: who is allowed to treat a patient located in Kansas from somewhere else.

The definition in K.S.A. 40-2,211 is worth reading closely, because its exclusions are deliberate. Telemedicine must be delivered "by means of real-time two-way interactive audio, visual, or audio-visual communications," and the definition expressly includes secure video conferencing and store-and-forward technology. Then it lists what does not count. Between a physician and a patient, the statute excludes only communication "that consists solely of an email or facsimile transmission." The telephone voice-only exclusion, notably, appears only in the provider-to-provider clause. So Kansas wrote "audio" into the affirmative definition and chose not to exclude a real-time phone call between a physician and a patient, while making clear that an email thread by itself is never a telemedicine visit.

On licensing, K.S.A. 65-28,135(a) opens with "notwithstanding any other provision of law": a physician licensed in another state "may practice telemedicine to treat patients located in the state of Kansas, if such physician receives a telemedicine waiver issued by the state board of healing arts." The waiver process is defined and fast. The board "shall issue such a waiver within 15 days from receipt of a complete application" if the physician holds an unrestricted license in another state or meets Kansas licensure qualifications, is not under investigation or disciplinary action, and pays a fee capped at $100, with annual renewal capped at the same amount. One reservation survives: subsection (h) lets the licensing agency deny an application it determines may endanger the health and safety of the public. Subsection (d) then closes the accountability gap: a waiver holder "shall be considered a licensee" and is subject to all Kansas rules governing the profession, so the Kansas Board of Healing Arts can discipline a remote physician exactly as it would a local one.

The remote-prescribing condition sits in the same statute. K.S.A. 65-28,135(b) requires that a physician practicing telemedicine "conduct an appropriate assessment and evaluation of the patient's current condition and document the appropriate medical indication for any prescription issued." The statutory test is a real assessment and a documented indication, judged by the same standard of care as an office visit, rather than a mandatory in-person step; alongside it, K.S.A. 40-2,214 directs the Board of Healing Arts to maintain rules and regulations on prescribing drugs, including controlled substances, via telemedicine, so board rules apply as well. For patients, the practical meaning is that in Kansas a properly conducted telehealth visit can lawfully begin the relationship, and any prescription must rest on an evaluation the physician actually performed and recorded.

You can verify any physician's Kansas license at the Kansas State Board of Healing Arts.