K.     "Nurse Licensure Compact" means the agreement entered into between New Mexico and other jurisdictions permitting the practice of professional registered nursing or licensed practical nursing pursuant to a multistate licensure privilege;

L.     "nursing diagnosis" means a clinical judgment about individual, family or community responses to actual or potential health problems or life processes, which judgment provides a basis for the selection of nursing interventions to achieve outcomes for which the person making the judgment is accountable;

M.     "practice of nursing" means assisting individuals, families or communities in maintaining or attaining optimal health, assessing and implementing a plan of care to accomplish defined goals and evaluating responses to care and treatment.  This practice is based on specialized knowledge, judgment and nursing skills acquired through educational preparation in nursing and in the biological, physical, social and behavioral sciences and includes but is not limited to:

(1)     initiating and maintaining comfort measures;

(2)     promoting and supporting optimal human functions and responses;

(3)     establishing an environment conducive to well-being or to the support of a dignified death;

(4)     collaborating on the health care regimen;

(5)     administering medications and performing treatments prescribed by a person authorized in this state or in any other state in the United States to prescribe them;

(6)     recording and reporting nursing observations, assessments, interventions and responses to health care;

(7)     providing counseling and health teaching;

(8)     delegating and supervising nursing interventions that may be performed safely by others and are not in conflict with the Nursing Practice Act; and

(9)     maintaining accountability for safe and effective nursing care;

N.     "professional registered nursing" means the practice of the full scope of nursing requiring substantial knowledge of the biological, physical, social and behavioral sciences and of nursing theory and may include advanced practice pursuant to the Nursing Practice Act.  This practice includes but is not limited to:

(1)     assessing the health status of individuals, families and communities;

(2)     establishing a nursing diagnosis;

(3)     establishing goals to meet identified health care needs;

(4)     developing a plan of care;

(5)     determining nursing intervention to implement the plan of care;

(6)     implementing the plan of care commensurate with education and verified competence;

(7)     evaluating responses to interventions;

(8)     teaching based on the theory and practice of nursing;

(9)     managing and supervising the practice of nursing;

(10)     collaborating with other health care professionals in the management of health care; and

(11)     conducting nursing research;

O.     "registered nurse" means a nurse who practices professional registered nursing and whose name and pertinent information are entered in the register of licensed registered nurses maintained by the board or a nurse who practices professional registered nursing pursuant to a multistate licensure privilege as provided in the Nurse Licensure Compact;

P.     "scope of practice" means the parameters within which nurses practice based upon education, experience, licensure, certification and expertise; and

Q.     "training program" means an educational program approved by the board.