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MS · STATE RULES

Telehealth rules in Mississippi

Mississippi is one of the few states that will not let a stored intake do the work of a visit. The Board of Medical Licensure says plainly that store-and-forward technology may enhance a real-time interaction with the patient but never replace it, and that a simple questionnaire without an appropriate examination breaks the rule. A separate prescribing regulation then demands a good faith prior examination before any drug is written. The first encounter here is live.

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First visit
Live visit first
Physician license
Own license only
Controlled drugs
Good faith exam before any drug
Nurse practitioners
Reduced practice

Rules checked September 2026 · 27 sources cited

ONLY IN MISSISSIPPI

What is different about Mississippi

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

  1. 01 · First visit

    A stored image can add to a visit, not be one

    Board Rule 2635-5.5 requires an appropriate examination before diagnosis and treatment, allows provider-to-patient contact by audio and video or by audio alone where medically appropriate, and then draws the line: store-and-forward technology may enhance a real-time interaction but never replace it. The same rule states that a simple questionnaire without an appropriate examination violates the policy and may bring discipline.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.5

    Across the border

    • Louisiana

      A permit holder there may skip the in-person history and examination where the technology carries the standard of care, with only an online, electronic or written mail message ruled out.

      Source: LAC 46:XLV.7505

    • Arkansas

      Access to a health record another clinician already keeps opens the relationship there, and on that route a provider may treat and prescribe a drug that is not controlled.

      Source: Ark. Code 17-80-402

    • Tennessee

      An encounter there may run with or without a facilitator, so long as the technology lets the remote provider verify who the patient is and where they are sitting.

      Source: Tenn. Comp. R. & Regs. 0880-02-.16

    • Alabama

      The relationship opens there on the patient's own request or on a referral, and synchronous contact is reserved for prescriptions of controlled substances.

      Source: Ala. Code 34-24-703

  2. 02 · Practice

    Stored consults stay close to home

    Miss. Code 83-9-353 attaches two conditions to store-and-forward care that few states impose. The reviewing provider is to be licensed here and affiliated with an established in-state health care facility, unless the service is not available within the state at all. And the patient must be told they may have a real-time interaction with the distant specialist, which then has to happen at the consultation or within thirty days of the request.

    Source: Miss. Code 83-9-353

    Across the border

    • Louisiana

      Asynchronous transfer technology sits inside the telehealth definition there, which excludes only email, text and fax that fall short of federal privacy standards.

      Source: La. R.S. 40:1223.4

    • Arkansas

      Arkansas attaches no facility condition to the reviewing clinician, insisting instead that the professional relationship already exist before any telemedicine service is delivered.

      Source: Ark. Code 17-80-403

    • Tennessee

      Health information may travel at store-and-forward level there whether or not a facilitator is present, and nothing ties the reading clinician to an in-state building.

      Source: Tenn. Comp. R. & Regs. 0880-02-.16

    • Alabama

      Asynchronous communication is named inside the statutory definition of telemedicine there, with no affiliation condition placed on whoever reads the transmitted data.

      Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Alabama

  3. 03 · Practice

    Remote emergency help is sized to the hospital

    Board Rule 2635-5.7 limits emergency telemedicine by the size of the receiving hospital. A licensed physician may consult remotely with a nurse practitioner or physician assistant in an emergency department whose average daily census runs to fifty or fewer occupied acute care and medical surgical beds, with the Board free to consider facilities between fifty-one and one hundred. The consulting physician is board certified or board eligible in emergency medicine, and the receiving center keeps transfer agreements with higher-level facilities.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.7

    Across the border

    • Louisiana

      Board rules there bar a physician from using telemedicine to supervise allied health professionals in the state without a full and unrestricted license to practice medicine.

      Source: LAC 46:XLV.7513

    • Arkansas

      An emergency lifts the professional relationship requirement outright there, rather than deciding which hospitals may receive a remote consultation.

      Source: Ark. Code 17-80-403

    • Tennessee

      A facilitator physically present with the patient may carry the encounter there, and one is required whenever the patient has not yet turned eighteen.

      Source: Tenn. Comp. R. & Regs. 0880-02-.16

    • Alabama

      A video visit attended in person by someone licensed by the medical or nursing board counts as an in-person visit there, with no test applied to the building.

      Source: Ala. Code 34-24-704

  4. 04 · Licenses

    One narrow opening for out-of-state readings

    Board Rule 2635-5.2 places the practice of telemedicine where the patient is located and reserves it to providers holding a valid license here. The single opening is for clinical laboratory, pathology and histopathology interpretations, which an unlicensed physician may perform so long as a licensed provider oversees the interpretation and keeps exclusive control over any later therapy and any additional diagnostic work.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.2

    Across the border

    • Louisiana

      An out-of-state physician there works under a telemedicine permit, a credential that bars opening an office, meeting patients or taking their calls inside the state.

      Source: LAC 46:XLV.7507

    • Arkansas

      Applicants there go through the ordinary state board process and a centralized credentials verification service, with no telemedicine-only credential on offer.

      Source: Arkansas State Medical Board

    • Tennessee

      Remote physicians there come in on the ordinary medical license, and the rule leaves legacy telemedicine licensees without any prescriptive authority.

      Source: Tenn. Comp. R. & Regs. 0880-02-.16

    • Alabama

      A physician licensed elsewhere may treat patients there on fewer than ten days in a calendar year, or for fewer than ten patients, without a state license at all.

      Source: Ala. Code 34-24-702

PRACTICE RULES

How telehealth works in Mississippi

Telemedicine standards live in Part 2635, Chapter 5 of the Board of Medical Licensure's rules, adopted under Miss. Code 73-25-34. The chapter is short, and it reads like a checklist rather than a framework.

  1. 01

    The practice happens where the patient is

    The rules fix the location of the practice at the patient's side, which settles the licensing question before any analysis of where the clinician sits or where the company is incorporated.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.2

  2. 02

    Two charts become one record

    Where a patient has both a primary treating physician and a remote provider working on the same condition, the rules treat the two files as a single complete patient record. That is a records design question, not only a courtesy, and it shapes what a brand has to be able to send and receive.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.6

  3. 03

    Consent covers the failure case

    Informed consent is obtained before care is given through the technology, and the patient is told the risks and benefits of being treated over a network, including how to get follow-up care or help after an adverse reaction or an equipment failure.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.3

  4. 04

    Six steps open the relationship

    A valid relationship here means verifying that the person asking for treatment is who they claim to be, taking an appropriate history and examination to the standard of care, reaching a diagnosis through accepted practice, discussing options to obtain informed consent, ensuring appropriate follow-up care is available, and keeping a complete record available to the patient and to other treating providers.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.4

  5. 05

    The rules speak to physicians and assistants

    For this chapter, provider means a physician or physician assistant holding an unrestricted license to practice medicine here, which is narrower than the professions the general telehealth conversation usually covers.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.1

FIRST VISIT

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

No, a live visit comes first

No. Store-and-forward technology may enhance a real-time interaction with the patient but never replace it, and a simple questionnaire without an appropriate examination is a rule violation, so a new patient is seen live before a first prescription.

This is the question that decides a product design here, and the Board answered it in the rule text rather than in a meeting note. Intake still matters; it simply cannot be the whole encounter.

  1. 01

    Live audio, or audio and video

    The rule contemplates provider-to-patient contact by audio and video, or by audio alone where that is medically appropriate. A brand does not always need video, but it does need a person on the other end at the same time.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.5

  2. 02

    A form is not an examination

    The rule names the failure mode directly: a simple questionnaire without an appropriate examination violates the policy, and the Board treats that as grounds for discipline against the license.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.5

  3. 03

    Someone on site can do the hands-on part

    Where a health care provider is physically with the patient, that provider may perform the physical examination and pass the findings to the remote physician, which is how the rule expects an adequate assessment to happen at a distance.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.5

  4. 04

    Stored data keeps a supporting role

    Photographs, uploads and monitoring data are useful and are contemplated by statute, but the patient retains the right to ask for real-time contact with the distant specialist, and that contact must follow at the consultation or inside thirty days.

    Source: Miss. Code 83-9-353

PRESCRIBING

Prescriptions and controlled drugs in Mississippi

There is no telehealth-specific controlled-substance rule here. What binds a remote prescriber instead is the general prescribing chapter, which sets an examination precondition that applies to every drug, controlled or not.

  1. 01

    A good faith prior examination

    Board Rule 2640-1.4 bars a prescription issued without a good faith prior examination and a medical indication. The licensee takes and records an appropriate medical history, carries out an appropriate physical examination, and records the results. That precondition reaches legend drugs, not only scheduled ones.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2640-1.4

  2. 02

    One registration, not two

    The Board accepts federal registration in place of a separate state controlled-substance registration with the Board, so a prescriber here keeps one authority rather than two. Every licensee with prescriptive authority still enrolls in the state monitoring program.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2640-1.3

  3. 03

    The database has its own cadence

    Outside a pain management practice, the monitoring program is searched on first contact with a new patient and at least every three months after. A pain management licensee searches at every encounter that produces a controlled prescription, and any licensee does so when prescribing an opioid for non-cancer pain.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2640-1.3

  4. 04

    Records run seven years

    Patient records document the diagnosis and the reason for prescribing, with the drug name, dose, strength, quantity and date, and are kept for seven years and produced to the Board on request.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2640-1.4

  5. 05

    Federal conditions apply in full

    For controlled substances the federal telemedicine conditions govern, and they run through December 31, 2026. The state examination precondition sits underneath them and does not lapse when the federal position moves.

    Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Mississippi

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 Mississippi

A clinician treating a patient located here holds a license issued here. There is no telehealth registration and no telemedicine-only credential, and the expedited routes in are the compacts.

  1. 01

    A valid license, with one opening

    Only holders of a valid license may practice any form of telemedicine with a patient in the state, and the sole exception in the rule covers laboratory, pathology and histopathology interpretation under a licensee's oversight and control.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.2

  2. 02

    Consulting at an in-state request

    A physician licensed elsewhere is expected to hold a license here unless the work is a consultation requested by an in-state provider about a patient that provider already treats, which is an exception for colleagues rather than a route to market.

    Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Mississippi

  3. 03

    Compacts carry the team

    The state takes part in the physician compact alongside the nursing, counseling, psychology, occupational therapy, physical therapy, social work and dietetics compacts, which matters for a brand staffing several disciplines behind one product.

    Source: Center for Connected Health Policy: Mississippi

  4. 04

    Nurse practitioners collaborate

    Advanced practice nurses work under a collaborative arrangement with a physician rather than independently, which is why the national practice-environment survey places this state in the reduced class.

    Source: AANP: full practice authority brief

  5. 05

    Collaboration has its own rules

    The Board of Medical Licensure publishes the collaboration requirements separately from the telemedicine chapter, and those requirements bind the physician on the other side of the agreement as well as the nurse practitioner.

    Source: Miss. Board of Medical Licensure, collaboration rules

How Tessic Health's providers are licensed in Mississippi

ADVERTISING

Marketing to patients in Mississippi

Marketing answers to a health care advertising statute that is unusually prescriptive about titles, and to the medical practice act's grounds for discipline. Both bite on the clinician's license, not only on the company.

  1. 01

    Name the profession in the ad

    Miss. Code 41-121-5 reaches any communication, printed, electronic or oral, that names a practitioner in relation to their practice, and requires the designation that matches the license: surgeon, medical doctor or doctor of medicine for a physician, and the corresponding letters for a nurse practitioner, registered nurse or licensed practical nurse.

    Source: Miss. Code 41-121-5

  2. 02

    Overstated skill is deceptive

    The same statute treats as deceptive any advertisement that misstates or falsely describes a practitioner's profession, skills, training, expertise, education, board certification or licensure, which reaches bios and credential badges as readily as headline claims.

    Source: Miss. Code 41-121-5

  3. 03

    Flamboyant claims draw discipline

    Miss. Code 73-25-29 lists flamboyant claims about a licensee's professional excellence among the grounds for discipline, and ties the deceptive advertisement statute into the licensing consequence.

    Source: Miss. Code 73-25-29

  4. 04

    No fee on a promise of a cure

    The same section reaches obtaining a fee as personal compensation or gain on a fraudulent representation that a condition can be cured, and separately reaches fraudulent, deceitful or dishonest practice connected to the license.

    Source: Miss. Code 73-25-29

  5. 05

    A live visit belongs in the offer

    An advertisement that promises treatment from an online form alone describes something the rules do not permit here, so the appointment step belongs in the creative rather than in the small print.

    Source: 30 Miss. Code R. 2635-5.5

TESSIC HEALTH IN MISSISSIPPI

How Tessic Health's providers cover Mississippi

Because the binding rule here is about modality rather than about a drug list, the product change lands at the top of the funnel. Every practice set out below traces back to one of the rules cited earlier on this page.

  1. 01

    The first appointment is a live one

    A new patient in this state is booked with a licensed provider for a real-time visit, by video or by audio where that is medically appropriate, before any prescription is written.

  2. 02

    Intake feeds the visit

    Questionnaire answers, photographs and uploads are gathered ahead of the appointment and read into the chart, and they are never treated as the examination the rules require.

  3. 03

    History and examination before any drug

    The provider takes and records a history and carries out an examination appropriate to the condition before writing anything, controlled or not, and the result goes into a record retained for seven years.

  4. 04

    The monitoring program on schedule

    Providers treating patients here enroll in the state monitoring program, search it when a new patient first arrives and at least quarterly after, and search it again at any encounter producing an opioid for non-cancer pain.

  5. 05

    How medication reaches the patient

    Dispensing for patients in this state runs through pharmacies holding the permits to ship here, at 0% markup, with refrigerated products moving under cold chain for the whole journey.

COMMON QUESTIONS

Questions about telehealth in Mississippi

  • No. The rule allows store-and-forward technology to enhance a real-time interaction but never to replace one, and calls a simple questionnaire without an appropriate examination a violation. An intake form can gather history before the live appointment that opens treatment.

  • Not necessarily. The rule contemplates contact by audio and video, or by audio alone where that is medically appropriate. What it does not allow is an encounter with no real-time contact at all, however detailed the uploaded material is.

  • No. The Board accepts federal registration in place of a separate registration with the Board, so a prescriber keeps one controlled-substance authority. Enrollment in the state monitoring program is still required of every licensee with prescriptive authority.

  • Outside a pain management practice, on first contact with a new patient and at least every three months after that. A pain management licensee searches at every encounter that produces a controlled prescription, and any licensee searches when prescribing an opioid for non-cancer pain.

  • No. The rules place the practice of telemedicine where the patient is located and reserve it to holders of a valid license issued by this state. The one narrow opening covers laboratory, pathology and histopathology interpretation performed under a licensee's oversight and control.

  • Both files count as one. Where a patient has a primary treating physician and a remote provider working the same condition, the rules treat the primary physician's record and the remote provider's record as a single complete patient record.

SOURCES

Rules checked September 2026 · 27 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.

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