Implementation of Sexual Assault Survivors Emergency Treatment Act (SASETA) Update

Recap of the changes
After January 1, 2022 (yes, only a little more than a year from now) every sexual assault survivor will need to be cared for by a Qualified Medical Provider (QMP) available within 90 minutes from the survivor’s arrival to the Emergency Department (ED). QMP for adults/adolescent patients can be an Adult/Adolescent Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) or physician/physician assistant who has obtained training to qualify them as a Sexual Assault Forensic Examiner (SAFE). QMP for pediatric patients (12 years old and under) can be a pediatric SANE/SAFE or a board certified/board eligible child abuse pediatrician. Based on which providers are available in the hospital, hospitals need to choose their designation under SASETA as one of the following:

1. Treatment Hospital (providing care for adult, adolescent and pediatric sexual assault survivors)
2. Transfer Hospital (all sexual assault survivors are transferred to a Treatment hospital with which the Transfer hospital has a written agreement. Adult/adolescent survivors can be transferred to Treatment Hospital with Approved Pediatric Transfer if it is closer than a Treatment hospital)
3. Treatment Hospital with Approved Pediatric Transfer, which is a new category (providing care for adult and adolescent sexual assault survivors and transferring the pediatric patients). This option also requires a written agreement with a Treatment Hospital that would accept transfers of all the pediatric sexual assault survivors.

Good news for survivors
Illinois State Police launched an online kit tracking system to allow survivors to track progress of their evidence kits. Survivors will be given a case number for the system that will allow them to track the evidence through the following 5 steps: initial collection at the healthcare facility, receipt by law enforcement, receipt by forensic lab, lab analysis, or when the report is sent from the lab to law enforcement agency. The law is not retroactive, only new cases will be assigned a tracking number.

Education for emergency department staff
Hopefully we have all completed 2 hours of sexual assault education by the end of June 2020. The future requirement is 2 hours of education every 2 years.

Number of sexual assault survivors in Illinois
We already have a year and a half of data collected statewide on the number of survivors. As with other patients, there was a decrease during the initial months of Covid-19.

Resources and educational materials available from the Office of Attorney General:
http://www.illinoisattorneygeneral.gov/victims/saimplementationtaskforce.html

For questions regarding above materials or issues regarding to SANE email sane@atg.state.il.us or contact Dr. Pitzele, your ICEP representative on the Implementation Task Force, at monika.pitzele@sinai.org