License verification
Medical License Lookup by State
A license is issued and verified by a state board, not by CMS or by a directory. Pick the state below to reach its official search, then finish with the federal checks that no state search covers.
Official license search by state
| State | Licensing body | NPPES providers | Board actions per 1,000 licensees |
|---|---|---|---|
| Florida | Florida Board of Medicine (Department of Health, MQA) | 470,495 | 6.4 (2023) |
| California | Medical Board of California | 974,315 | 3.8 (2023) |
| Texas | Texas Medical Board | 433,013 | 4.5 (2023) |
| Ohio | State Medical Board of Ohio | 327,042 | 3.3 (2023) |
| New York | NYS Education Department, Office of the Professions | 545,291 | 3.1 (2023) |
| Georgia | Georgia Composite Medical Board | 168,093 | not compiled |
| North Carolina | North Carolina Medical Board | 200,340 | not compiled |
| Virginia | Virginia Department of Health Professions | 149,239 | not compiled |
| Pennsylvania | Pennsylvania Department of State (PALS) | 262,872 | 3.0 (2023) |
| Illinois | Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation | 241,958 | 2.5 (2023) |
Another state? The FSMB directory of state medical boards links every board's own search.
Which search covers which profession
Physicians (MD, DO)
The state medical board where the physician practices; DocInfo for every state at once.
Nurse practitioners and nurses
Nursys for most RN, LPN and APRN licenses, or the state board of nursing.
Physician assistants
The state medical board (most states license PAs there); certification on NCCPA.
Pharmacists
The state board of pharmacy; several states run one search for all health professions (Florida, Ohio, Virginia).
Dentists
The state board of dentistry; again, several states use one combined search.
A complete verification in five checks
- Identity: find the provider's NPI in the NPI lookup and confirm name, specialty and practice address.
- License: search the state board for an active license and read any public orders.
- Other states: for physicians, DocInfo shows licenses and actions in every state.
- Exclusions: search the HHS-OIG exclusion list for a Medicare and Medicaid ban.
- Certification: ABMS or AOA for physicians, NCCPA for PAs, AANP or ANCC for nurse practitioners.
Method and sources
Each state link was confirmed on 2026-09-25 from the live search results and a direct request. Provider counts are NPPES records with a practice address in the state, as loaded on 2026-08-27. Board action rates come from each board's annual reporting as compiled by PlainDoctor (10 states so far). PlainDoctor is not a primary-source verifier.
Every figure on PlainDoctor is rendered directly from the federal CMS NPPES registry, Medicare Part D, MIPS, and Open Payments records, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026-08-27.