Search routes
Find a person you can check.
Ask your usual doctor for a referral—a suggestion for whom to see—or contact a practice yourself.
The state medical board gives doctors their licences: permission to practise.
Check that permission in its public licence record. The health professional who assesses you is your clinician.
Words, unpacked
Public discipline means action a medical board has made public against a doctor.
Ask for a referral from someone who knows your care
If you already see a clinician, explain the problem you want assessed. A referral is a suggestion to see another clinician.
- Ask what type of practice could assess that problem.
- Ask why the suggested person fits the question.
- Write down the person's full name, then check it.
Use the state's doctor licence record to check a name
A state medical board publishes whether a doctor's licence is valid and any public action it has taken, as of September 17, 2026.
The state gives permission to practise through a licence. Public discipline means action the board has made public against a doctor.
To open a state board's own website, use the Federation of State Medical Boards list, which provides those links as of September 17, 2026.
Some states file doctors' records separately according to whether their names carry MD or DO.
- Use the directory below to open your state's board website.
- Search the full name and read whether the licence is valid now.
- Read any public action or licence limits shown.
- If no name appears, check the spelling. Ask the practice which state office holds that doctor's licence record.
Finding no public action in a record gives you no rating of care quality.
Ask a practice who would assess you
For an in-person visit, ask who you would see. Ask who you would see for telehealth too: that means care through video calls, phone calls or messages online.
HHS means the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Your physical location for a visit is key: the doctor needs a licence or another legal basis for practice in that state, HHS guidance says, as of September 26, 2026.
State rules set what permission the doctor needs to treat you there.
- Who will assess my health, and where do I verify that person's licence?
- Can that person practise where I will be during the visit?
- What can happen online, and what may need a visit in person?
Check the pharmacy as well
Find out which pharmacy will prepare or send your medicine, and write down its name. Then look up that name, too.
FDA is short for the US Food and Drug Administration.
To reach a state's pharmacy licence search, follow the links FDA supplies, as of September 17, 2026.
A pharmacy name in the search shows that a licence is on record.
That entry offers no guarantee that each prescription is filled correctly.
- Check the pharmacy name and whether the licence is valid now.
- If the status is unclear, ask the state pharmacy office whether that pharmacy may operate now.
- Ask the pharmacy to clear up any mismatch before proceeding.