What Hines and Chiles mean for veterinary practice, and what they don’t

A new JAVMA article is trying to lower the temperature around two closely watched court decisions, Hines v. Pardue and Chiles v. Salazar, by explaining what they do, and don’t, mean for veterinary practice. In Hines, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled on September 26, 2024, that Texas, as applied to Dr. Ronald Hines, was directly regulating speech when it punished him for giving veterinary advice without first establishing the required in-person veterinarian-client-patient relationship, and that the rule failed even intermediate First Amendment scrutiny. The court sent the case back with instructions to enter judgment for Hines. In Chiles, the U.S. Supreme Court held on March 31, 2026, that Colorado’s conversion-therapy law, as applied to a counselor’s talk therapy, regulated speech based on viewpoint. The throughline, as Goldberg’s plain-language guide argues, is that these are speech cases, not a wholesale dismantling of states’ authority to regulate professional conduct. (ca5.uscourts.gov)

Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, the practical takeaway is narrower than some headlines suggest. These rulings may strengthen constitutional arguments around teleadvice, teletriage, and other communications that look more like speech than diagnosis, treatment, or prescribing. But they do not automatically erase VCPR requirements, nor do they strip states of authority to regulate the actual practice of veterinary medicine. That distinction is already shaping industry interpretation: the Georgia Veterinary Medical Association’s legal counsel, for example, told members the cases do not “dismantle the VCPR” and said states can still regulate diagnosing, treating, and prescribing as professional conduct. (gvma.net)

What to watch: Expect more state-by-state scrutiny of telemedicine statutes, board rules, and how clearly they separate protected speech from regulated clinical conduct. (gvma.net)