What Can a Vet Tech Do in Maryland?

Since October 1, 2024, the delegation question in Maryland is answered by statute: §2-309.1 writes two lists and pins each to a supervision tier — thirteen veterinary-assistant tasks under direct supervision, anesthesia setup and monitoring under immediate supervision, and fifteen registered-technician procedures under direct supervision, subject to the reserved list in subsection (e).

The statutory terms decide who each list belongs to: the technician procedures run to a person registered with the Board (§2-301(j)(1)), and the assistant lists run to a "veterinary assistant", defined as someone who aids in patient care and is not so registered (§2-301(h-1)).

For a practice manager, a Maryland delegation policy can now quote the statute line for line — with the caveat, developed below, that the older COMAR chapters have not been updated to match it in the sources read.

Direct supervision means the supervising veterinarian is on the premises of the animal treatment facility, is available on an immediate basis, and has given written or oral instructions for the patients involved.

Immediate supervision is tighter: the veterinarian is in the immediate area and within audible and visual range of the patient and the person treating it.

Indirect supervision is looser: the veterinarian need not be in the same facility or in close proximity, but must have given instructions, be available by electronic or telephonic means, and have arranged telephonic consultation if necessary.

On the statute's lists, the technician procedures and the main assistant list run at direct supervision, assistant anesthesia work at immediate, and indirect supervision enters only through the qualified-technician allowance in subsection (d).

The pre-2024 regulations add a separate term — COMAR 15.14.01.17A(2) defines "responsible direct supervision" as "competent, immediate, and active supervision".

Subsection (e) is a short, absolute list: a veterinary technician may not make any diagnosis or prognosis, prescribe any treatments, drugs, medications, or appliances, or perform surgery — at any supervision level.

The technician procedure list opens "subject to subsection (e)", so nothing on the fifteen items can be read past those three bars.

The surgery bar does real work at the edges of the task list: a simple extraction of a loose tooth is a listed procedure, while an extraction needing flaps or tooth sectioning crosses into reserved territory.

Section 2-309.1(c)(1) lets a registered technician induce anesthesia by intramuscular injection, inhalation, or intravenous injection, under direct supervision.

The older chapters add a condition the statute does not: COMAR 15.14.13.13C and 15.14.01.17D(2) require the veterinarian to maintain direct visual supervision or contact while a technician induces by the inhalation or IV routes.

Both texts exist; the regulations predate the 2024 statute, and the sources read do not resolve beyond that — a technician doing inhalation or IV inductions should put the question to the board rather than pick a reading.

Assistants sit lower in the statute: they may set up anesthesia and monitor it under immediate supervision of a veterinary practitioner or veterinary technician, and the older COMAR 15.14.01.17C still bars an unregistered employee from performing induction by any route.

A registered technician may perform simple dental extractions of loose teeth that do not involve flaps or tooth sectioning, under direct supervision — the working test is in the statute's own words.

An extraction needing flaps or tooth sectioning is surgery under subsection (e)(3) and stays with the veterinarian.

The assistant list names dental prophylaxis — cleanings — but no extraction task, and the older COMAR 15.14.01.17C separately bars an unregistered employee from dental extractions.

A candidate interviewing for a dental-heavy Maryland role is being hired against the registered list, not the assistant one.

Maryland writes suturing into the technician list rather than leaving it to custom: subsection (c)(3) lists basic suturing skills under direct supervision, defined as suturing of existing surgical skin or gingival incisions and suture and staple removal.

The wording is itself the boundary — the permission covers incisions that already exist, plus suture and staple removal — and surgery remains reserved by subsection (e)(3).

The contrast with unregistered staff is sharp here: COMAR 15.14.01.17C still bars an unregistered employee from "suturing of existing surgical skin incisions".

The statute writes euthanasia narrowly.

At an animal emergency hospital, a technician may perform it at the veterinary practitioner's discretion and only where the animal cannot be saved by supportive care, first aid, or life support; at an animal shelter, a technician who works in or for the shelter may perform euthanasia there.

Those are the only two settings the statute states.

Rabies runs through a different article: the technician vaccine procedure excludes rabies vaccines "unless otherwise authorized by law", and the one authorization the sources read found is Health-Gen. §18-313(6), which lets a veterinary technician or other clinical staff vaccinate at a licensed animal shelter or animal control facility under four conditions, ending with the vaccinator being identified on the rabies certificate.

Outside that shelter and animal-control setting, the exclusion holds.

Since October 1, 2024 the assistant role is statutory: a "veterinary assistant" aids a veterinarian or veterinary technician in patient care and is not registered with the Board as a veterinary technician.

The direct-supervision list runs to thirteen items — vitals on a nonanesthetized patient, radiographs, dental prophylaxis, administering medications, sample collection, surgery setup, microchip insertion among the named tasks — and closes at item (13) with a catch-all: any other skill that is noninvasive, as defined by the Board, and within the assistant's skills as the supervising practitioner determines.

Anesthesia setup and monitoring sit one tier tighter, under immediate supervision of a veterinary practitioner or veterinary technician.

The fifteen technician procedures — induction, intubation, extractions, suturing, cystocentesis — belong to the registered technician only, the older COMAR 15.14.01.17C still bars an unregistered employee from anesthesia induction, casts and splints, dental extractions, and suturing of existing surgical skin incisions, and the general employee exclusion in §2-301(g)(7), for auxiliary or supporting assistance under responsible direct supervision, also remains in force.

Agric. §2-309(a) still reads "a person may register with the Board as a veterinary technician" — registration is optional at the individual level, and §2-313(a)(2)(vii) bars a person from advertising as a Board registered veterinary technician unless registered.

What changed in 2024 is that the statute no longer treats registered and unregistered staff as interchangeable: the fifteen-procedure list runs to registered technicians only, and unregistered aides get the separate veterinary assistant list.

For a candidate, that split is the practical question at hire — which list a role's duties actually draw from — and for a practice manager it is the line a delegation policy has to keep visible.

Section 2-309.1 was enacted by 2024 Md.

Laws Ch. 487 (HB 1097) and took effect October 1, 2024, creating the statutory veterinary-assistant scope, moving the technician procedure list into statute, and adding cystocentesis, gastric and tracheal intubation, euthanasia in the two named settings, and the indirect-supervision allowance.

Health-Gen. §18-313(6), the shelter and animal-control rabies authorization, was added by 2023 Md.

Laws Ch. 588 (HB 325).

The COMAR chapters predate all of this — 15.14.13.13 was last amended effective October 15, 2012 — so where an older regulation differs from the statute, this page says both exist and that the regulation is older; it does not claim the regulations are repealed.

The differences run in both directions: the older COMAR 15.14.13.13B(2) lets a registered technician apply casts and splints under responsible direct supervision, while §2-309.1(c) names no casts-or-splints item — its only catch-all is (c)(15), which defers to Board regulations.

Subsection (d) is the one route the statute writes for a technician to a procedure on the assistant list: indirect supervision, but only after the veterinary practitioner determines the technician is qualified to perform it.

The statute names no supervision tier for a technician the practitioner has not found qualified on that list.

Subsection (f) adds an emergency tier: under emergency conditions only, a technician may perform life support care, including basic and advanced cardiopulmonary resuscitation, before the practitioner's initial examination, with anything further left to Board regulations.

Both permissions carry their preconditions on their face — the practitioner's qualification determination, and the emergency condition — so the permission depends on them, not on practice custom.