AI Regulation Tracker / Licensing and scope of practice
Delaware Bars a Nonhuman Entity or AI From Holding a Medical License or Using the Title
Signed into law April 23, 2026. Delaware House Bill 191 amends Title 24 of the Delaware Code so that a nonhuman entity, including an agent powered by artificial intelligence, cannot be licensed as a physician, physician assistant, or nurse, and cannot call itself a doctor, physician, or nurse.
Delaware has put into statute something the medical world has largely assumed but rarely wrote down. On April 23, 2026, the Governor signed House Bill 191, which amends Title 24 of the Delaware Code, the title that governs professional licensing. The change is short and blunt. It says that a nonhuman entity, including an agent powered by artificial intelligence, may not hold a health care license and may not use a protected professional title. The statutory language is direct: "A nonhuman entity, including an agent powered by artificial intelligence, may not be licensed" in the practice of professional nursing, and the same construction runs through the medicine and physician assistant provisions.
The title provision is the second half of the fix. The bill states that a nonhuman entity "may not use any of the following titles," and the list is the ones patients trust: Nurse, Doctor, Physician, Medical Doctor. Put the two provisions together and you have a clean rule. An AI system cannot be the licensed provider, and it cannot present itself to a Delaware patient as one.
Does this ban clinical AI in Delaware?
No, and it is worth being precise about that because the headline invites the wrong read. HB 191 does not prohibit using AI in a Delaware clinic or hospital. It does not touch clinical decision support, ambient documentation, triage tools, or diagnostic software. What it does is settle the question of who is licensed and accountable. The license belongs to a human being. The AI can assist that human, but it cannot stand in the human's place as the responsible, credentialed provider, and it cannot be dressed up in a professional title to imply that it can.
That distinction is the whole point. A lot of the anxiety about medical AI is really anxiety about accountability. If an autonomous agent makes a call and something goes wrong, who answers for it? Delaware has answered by law: a licensed human clinician, because the machine was never eligible to be the licensee in the first place.
Why write this into Title 24 at all?
Because the gap was becoming exploitable. As AI agents get more capable and more conversational, the marketing gets bolder. Products get described as an AI doctor or an AI nurse. Patient-facing chat tools answer clinical questions in the first person. Without an explicit rule, a company could argue that titles and licensure were silent on nonhuman systems. Delaware closed that argument. The state healthcare community, including the Delaware Healthcare Association, backed the measure precisely because it protects the meaning of a professional title and the licensure system behind it.
What Delaware clinicians and deployers should do now
For practicing physicians, PAs, and nurses, the practical takeaway is that your license is the anchor and it stays your responsibility. If you use an AI tool, you are the accountable provider, and you should be able to show your review and sign-off on what the tool produces. For health systems and vendors, audit your patient-facing language. If any product, chatbot, or interface is named or described in a way that implies it is a licensed doctor or nurse, that framing is now a direct statutory problem in Delaware. Rename it, add clear AI disclosure, and make sure a licensed human is identified as the responsible clinician.
This is also part of a broader pattern worth tracking. Texas requires physicians to disclose diagnostic AI to patients, California requires a licensed clinician rather than AI to make coverage decisions, and professional bodies abroad are pinning responsibility to the human physician. Delaware is attacking the same problem from the licensing end. The through line across all of them is the same: the accountable clinician is a person, and AI does not change who signs.
Questions professionals are asking
Does Delaware HB 191 ban using AI in medical practice?
No. It does not prohibit clinical AI tools. It states that a nonhuman entity, including an AI agent, cannot hold a professional health care license and cannot use titles like doctor, physician, or nurse. AI can assist a licensed human clinician, but it cannot be the licensed provider itself.
Who is legally accountable when a Delaware clinician uses AI?
The licensed human clinician. Because an AI system is barred from holding the license, the responsible provider of record is always the physician, PA, or nurse. Document your review and sign-off on anything an AI tool generates for patient care.
What exactly is prohibited under the title rule?
The statute says a nonhuman entity may not use titles such as Nurse, Doctor, Physician, or Medical Doctor. In practice that means you cannot market or present an AI product to Delaware patients as a licensed doctor or nurse, or name it in a way that implies it is one.
When did HB 191 take effect?
The Governor signed it into law on April 23, 2026. It is a binding Delaware statute amending Title 24, enforced through the state boards that license physicians, physician assistants, and nurses.
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Informational analysis for working professionals, not legal advice. Confirm how any statute or requirement applies to your situation with qualified counsel licensed in the relevant jurisdiction.