Must someone be on site while a patient is treated in Illinois?
Intake · part of The Practice Perimeter
Short answer
Yes for ablative laser procedures — the physician must be on site; for non-ablative, the physician may instead be available by phone or other electronic means. Delegating to an unlicensed person also requires a health care professional on site.
A physician may delegate the performance of ablative procedures to a licensed practical nurse, a registered professional nurse, or other persons, with on-site supervision by the physician; and may delegate the performance of non-ablative procedures to the same persons with on-site supervision by the physician, or the physician must be available by telephone or other electronic means to respond promptly to any question or complication that may occur.
68 Ill. Adm. Code 1285.336(b)(2)–(3) · verified Sep 8, 2026 · regulatory monitoring, not legal advice
Related Illinois rules
Effective January 1, 2025, an on-site physician examination before a non-ablative laser procedure is not required where four conditions are met: the facility follows a physician delegation protocol available to the Department on request; the examination is performed by an advanced practice registered nurse; the procedure is delegated by a physician and performed by an RN or LPN with documented training in each system; and a physician is available remotely by telephone or other electronic means to respond promptly to questions or complications.
225 ILCS 60/54.2(e) · verified Aug 17, 2026
The physician must examine the patient and determine a course of treatment appropriate to that patient before any procedure. A repeat examination is not required for each of several procedures carried out under an already established treatment plan.
68 Ill. Adm. Code 1285.336(b) · verified Aug 17, 2026
How other states answer this
- Alabama
- Alaska
- Arkansas
- Connecticut
- Delaware
- Florida
- Georgia
- Hawaii
- Indiana
- Iowa
- Maryland
- Michigan
- Mississippi
- Missouri
- Montana
- Nevada
- New Mexico
- New York
- North Carolina
- Ohio
- Oklahoma
- South Carolina
- Tennessee
- Texas
- Utah
- Virginia
- Washington
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← All Illinois rules and changes · MedSpaRadar is regulatory monitoring and reference: it summarizes public laws, regulations and agency actions and links each to its source. It is not legal, medical, or compliance advice, and using it creates no attorney-client relationship. A summary can lag its source or leave out detail, and monitoring itself can be interrupted — so an absence of alerts means nothing reached you, not that nothing happened. Read the cited source, check its effective date, and confirm any change to your operations or clinical practice with qualified health-law counsel and your medical director. Legislative data via LegiScan (CC BY 4.0).