Tessic Health

AK · STATE RULES

Telehealth rules in Alaska

Alaska regulates the company as well as the clinician. A business may not deliver telemedicine to anyone located in the state until it has registered the trading name it will use, and a prescriber who never physically examined the patient keeps the statute's protection only by asking permission to send the chart on to whoever provides that patient's regular care. An internet questionnaire or an email will not open a file for a new patient.

Book a DemoAll states
First visit
Async with conditions
Physician license
Compact joined, not open yet
Controlled drugs
Seven days on a first opioid
Nurse practitioners
Full practice

Rules checked September 2026 · 16 sources cited

ONLY IN ALASKA

What is different about Alaska

Each rule here is true of Alaska and of none of the states that border it. Beside each one: what the neighbours do instead.

  1. 01 · Practice

    The company registers before the first patient

    AS 44.33.381 puts a registry in the way of the business itself. A company performing telemedicine services registers with the Department of Commerce, Community and Economic Development before serving anyone located in the state, files a separate registration for each trading name it uses, and renews on a two-year cycle at a fee the statute adjusts for inflation.

    Source: AS 44.33.381

    Across the border

    • Washington

      Washington puts its extra step on the individual instead, making a provider who furnishes telemedicine complete the state's training and sign an attestation that is kept on file and produced on request.

      Source: RCW 43.70.495

    • Oregon

      Oregon reaches the corporate side through ownership rather than registration, barring a management services organization from holding shares in the professional entity it serves or a majority of its directors.

      Source: SB 951

  2. 02 · First visit

    A form and an email are not enough

    AS 08.64.364 names the two channels that cannot carry a new patient. A physician or physician assistant may not prescribe a drug in response to an internet questionnaire or an electronic mail message sent to a person with whom no prior relationship exists, whatever the drug happens to be.

    Source: AS 08.64.364

    Across the border

    • Washington

      Washington leaves the questionnaire alone and polices the channel by clock, reserving an audio-only encounter for someone who has had an appointment in the previous three years at that practice or the same medical group.

      Source: RCW 48.43.735

    • Oregon

      Oregon pushes the opposite way on the coverage side, forbidding a health benefit plan from conditioning payment on an existing patient-provider relationship or on consent given face to face.

      Source: ORS 743A.058

  3. 03 · Prescribing

    The patient's own doctor gets offered the notes

    The protection for prescribing without a physical examination is conditional, and one of the conditions is administrative rather than clinical. Under AS 08.64.364 the prescriber asks the person to consent to a copy of all records going to that person's primary care provider, and sends them where consent is given. Follow-up care has to be available as well.

    Source: AS 08.64.364

    Across the border

    • Washington

      Nothing in Washington law ties a remote prescription to where the notes end up. Its gate before an opioid is a monitoring-program query inside the phased pain rules the medical commission enforces.

      Source: WAC 246-919-850

    • Oregon

      Oregon leaves records routing to clinical judgment and runs its monitoring program as a tool prescribers may query, not as a checkpoint cleared before a prescription is written.

      Source: ORS chapter 431A

  4. 04 · Licenses

    A short list lets an outside doctor in

    AS 08.02.130 names the narrow cases in which a physician holding no license here may still treat a patient located in the state: ongoing treatment or follow-up tied to care that physician already provided, where the relationship began with an in-person visit, and a visit about a suspected or diagnosed life-threatening condition on referral from a locally licensed physician.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

    Across the border

    • Washington

      There is no unlicensed pathway in Washington at all. Compact membership shortens the paperwork, and what arrives at the end of it is still the ordinary state credential for the profession.

      Source: Washington Medical Commission

    • Oregon

      Oregon answers the same problem with a credential rather than an exemption, licensing a physician for remote practice alone and then barring that holder from seeing anyone in the state face to face.

      Source: ORS chapter 677

PRACTICE RULES

How telehealth works in Alaska

Two statutes carry the weight. The health care provider article in Title 8 sets what a remote visit may look like, and a commerce statute in Title 44 decides whether the business behind it may operate here at all.

  1. 01

    Register the name the patient sees

    Registration attaches to the business name used to perform telemedicine services, so a company operating several consumer brands files one registration for each of them. A state business license comes first, and its number goes on the application.

    Source: AS 44.33.381

  2. 02

    No need to justify skipping the office

    A health care provider may not be required to document a barrier to an in-person visit before delivering care through telehealth, and neither the department nor a board may limit the physical setting a provider works from. Remote care is not treated as a fallback that needs excusing.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

  3. 03

    Name the limits of the scope

    Where a service the patient came for sits beyond what the provider is authorized to do, the provider tells the patient so and may not charge for that portion of the encounter. Billing follows scope rather than the appointment length.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

  4. 04

    Consent before the visit, written or spoken

    Informed consent is obtained before telehealth services are rendered and documented in the patient's file. Either a written or a verbal consent is accepted, and it may cover a single visit or a defined period of care.

    Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Alaska

FIRST VISIT

Can a first visit happen without a live call in Alaska?

Yes, with conditions

Yes, within limits. No statute demands a prior in-person visit, and the board may not discipline a prescriber for treating without a physical examination where follow-up exists and the records offer was made, but a prescription answering an internet questionnaire or an email from a stranger falls outside that protection.

The first-visit question is settled by what the prescriber may not rely on. The statute shields a remote prescription generally and then withdraws the shield for two specific inputs, which makes the design question one of what the clinician actually interacted with.

  1. 01

    The two inputs that fail

    An internet questionnaire and an electronic mail message are named in the statute as things a prescription may not answer where the person is a stranger to the prescriber. An intake form can inform the visit; it cannot be the visit.

    Source: AS 08.64.364

  2. 02

    Follow-up is a condition, not a courtesy

    The protection for prescribing without a physical examination applies only where follow-up care is available to the person, so a single-transaction model that ends at the prescription is arguing outside the safe harbor.

    Source: AS 08.64.364

  3. 03

    Nothing forces the patient into a room

    Because a provider cannot be made to document a barrier to an in-person visit, there is no obligation to explain why a first encounter happened remotely. The clinical standard still decides whether it should have.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

  4. 04

    Controlled substances have their own gate

    Where the drug is controlled, the same section makes the protection subject to the separate opioid limits that follow it, so a first remote encounter for a scheduled medicine carries a second set of conditions.

    Source: AS 08.64.364

PRESCRIBING

Prescriptions and controlled drugs in Alaska

The state adds an opioid ceiling and a records step to the federal framework, and it also decides which professions may reach a controlled substance through a screen at all.

  1. 01

    Seven days on an opioid to start

    An initial outpatient opioid prescription may not exceed a seven-day supply for an adult, and the same ceiling applies to a minor with a conversation about risk with the parent or guardian. Going past it requires a documented reason and an explanation of why non-opioid options did not fit.

    Source: AS 08.64.363

  2. 02

    When the ceiling lifts

    Longer supplies are available for an acute condition, chronic pain, cancer pain or palliative care, for a patient who cannot reach a practitioner because of travel or logistics, and for treatment of substance abuse or opioid dependence with an approved medication.

    Source: AS 08.64.363

  3. 03

    Not every profession may prescribe remotely

    Physicians, osteopaths, podiatrists, physician assistants and advanced practice registered nurses may prescribe controlled substances through telehealth while meeting state and federal law. Dentists and optometrists reach a controlled substance only after an in-person examination.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

  4. 04

    The federal conditions still apply

    For scheduled drugs the binding constraints are federal, and the telemedicine flexibilities the Drug Enforcement Administration has extended run through December 31, 2026. State permission does not survive the federal question being answered differently.

    Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Alaska

Federal rules apply on top of every state's. Prescribing controlled substances by telehealth without an in-person visit runs on DEA flexibilities currently extended through December 31, 2026, with a permanent rule still pending.

LICENSES

Who can treat patients in Alaska

Physician licensing runs through the State Medical Board inside the Division of Corporations, Business and Professional Licensing, which also keeps the telemedicine business register. The two are separate filings and neither substitutes for the other.

  1. 01

    A registration is not a license

    The business register records a company's name, address and contact details. It confers no authority to practice, so every clinician behind the storefront still holds the individual credential their profession requires.

    Source: AS 44.33.381

  2. 02

    The compact is signed but not running

    The state joined the Interstate Medical Licensure Compact in June 2026 and the compact's own roster still lists it among the jurisdictions where implementation is in process, so no expedited license issues through that route yet.

    Source: Interstate Medical Licensure Compact: participating states

  3. 03

    Nurse practitioners carry their own authority

    The American Association of Nurse Practitioners places this state in the full practice column, where an advanced practice registered nurse assesses, diagnoses, orders tests and prescribes under the board of nursing without a physician agreement.

    Source: AANP: full practice authority brief

  4. 04

    Compacts beyond medicine

    Membership also covers the psychology, physician assistant, physical therapy, speech-language pathology and social work compacts, which matters when a brand staffs counseling or rehabilitation roles rather than physician roles.

    Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Alaska

How Tessic Health's providers are licensed in Alaska

ADVERTISING

Marketing to patients in Alaska

Marketing here meets a consumer statute with an unusually low trigger and a pricing rule written directly into the telehealth section, which together reach the offer as well as the claim.

  1. 01

    Treble damages without a willfulness finding

    A person who suffers an ascertainable loss from an unlawful trade practice may recover three times the actual damages or $500, whichever is greater. The statute asks for the loss and the unlawful act, not for proof that the seller meant it.

    Source: AS 45.50.531

  2. 02

    The remote price cannot be the premium price

    A fee for a service delivered through telehealth must be reasonable and consistent with the ordinary fee typically charged for that service, and may not exceed it. Convenience pricing for a virtual version of an ordinary visit runs into that sentence directly.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

  3. 03

    Do not sell what the clinician cannot do

    Because a provider must tell the patient when a requested service is outside their authorized scope and may not bill for that part, an offer written wider than the treating clinician's scope creates both a disclosure duty and a refund.

    Source: AS 08.02.130

  4. 04

    A questionnaire is not a promise

    Advertising that implies a prescription follows from completing a form describes something the prescribing statute rules out for a person with no prior relationship, and the claim would be measured against that section.

    Source: AS 08.64.364

TESSIC HEALTH IN ALASKA

How Tessic Health's providers cover Alaska

Coverage here begins one step earlier than in most states, because the entity has to appear on a public register before a single patient is seen. What follows is how the clinical rules above show up in the product.

  1. 01

    Registered before the storefront opens

    Each consumer-facing name used to deliver telemedicine to patients in this state is registered with the commerce department on its own filing, and the renewal falls on the two-year cycle the statute sets.

  2. 02

    A clinician reads before anything is written

    A first prescription for a patient here never rests on the intake form alone. The clinician works the history in a live or two-way exchange, because the statute names a questionnaire and an email as inputs a prescription may not answer.

  3. 03

    The records offer is part of the visit

    Every patient here is asked to consent to a copy of the record going to whoever provides their regular care, and where consent is given the record is sent, which is the condition the prescribing statute attaches.

  4. 04

    Opioid supply held to the statutory start

    A first outpatient opioid for a patient in this state is written at or below the seven-day supply, and any longer course carries the documented reason and the note on why non-opioid options were unsuitable.

  5. 05

    One price, whichever way the visit runs

    The fee charged for a remote service here matches the ordinary fee for that service rather than carrying a premium, medication is dispensed at 0% markup, and refrigerated products ship cold chain.

COMMON QUESTIONS

Questions about telehealth in Alaska

  • Yes. A business performing telemedicine services registers with the state commerce department before serving anyone located here, and each trading name it uses needs its own registration. A state business license is a prerequisite for the application.

  • Not for someone the prescriber does not already know. The statute forbids prescribing in response to an internet questionnaire or an electronic mail message where no prior relationship exists, so the form feeds the visit rather than replacing it.

  • Because the protection for prescribing without a physical examination depends on it. The prescriber asks the person to consent to a copy of all records going to their primary care provider and sends them if consent is given.

  • Only in narrow cases. Follow-up tied to care that physician already gave, where the relationship started with an in-person visit, and a referral from a locally licensed physician about a suspected or diagnosed life-threatening condition are the listed openings.

  • It joined in June 2026, but the compact still lists it among the jurisdictions where implementation is under way, so the expedited route is not open yet. Until it is, a physician applies to the State Medical Board directly.

  • No. The telehealth section requires the fee to be reasonable and consistent with the ordinary fee typically charged for that service, and it may not exceed that fee. Pricing a remote version at a premium runs against the statute.

SOURCES

Rules checked September 2026 · 16 sources cited. A planning summary, not legal advice. Statutes, board rules and enforcement priorities change; a brand's own counsel should review its model and marketing before launch.

OTHER STATES

Rules in other states

Each state page is researched from that state's own statutes and board rules.

All state pages →