Are Non-Competes Enforceable for Therapists and Behavioral Health Staff in Oregon?

Oregon decides this by statute, and the statute works as a checklist: an agreement that misses any item is not renegotiable — for agreements entered into on or after January 1, 2022, it is already void.

Void by default.

Per Oregon BOLI, non-competes entered into on or after January 1, 2022 that miss the statutory criteria are simply void, so your employee does not have to take any step to invalidate one.

Who can be bound at all.

ORS 653.295 only reaches salaried, overtime-exempt employees, and only if their annual gross salary and commissions at termination exceed $119,541 for terminations in 2026.

An hourly RBT, behavior technician or case manager fails the exempt test outright, and a salaried counselor below the threshold fails the pay test.

The one workaround.

For a non-exempt or below-threshold employee, Oregon keeps a non-compete enforceable for up to 12 months if you agree in writing to pay, during the restricted period, the greater of 50% of the employee's annual gross base salary and commissions or 50% of the inflation-adjusted threshold.

Prescribers.

Since June 9, 2025, Oregon has voided non-competes with medical licensees — psychiatrists, psychiatric nurse practitioners and physician associates among them — outside narrow statutory exceptions.

Everyone else.

Licensed professional counselors, clinical social workers, marriage and family therapists, psychologists, behavior analysts and RNs are not medical licensees, so the general checklist governs their agreements.

This page is Oregon only.

If you hire across state lines, the analysis changes at each border — the wider picture is in our guide to non-competes nationally.

Oregon's rule is statutory: ORS 653.295 sets the conditions for a valid employee non-compete, and the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) publishes the inflation-adjusted salary threshold and employer guidance.

Miss any of the first five conditions and, for agreements entered into on or after January 1, 2022, the covenant is void on its own; the term cap works differently, voiding only the remainder past 12 months.

Two conditions are easy to miss in practice: the offer has to be received at least two weeks before day one, so a disclosure that arrives after day one does not cure a standard new hire — the statute's only second chance is signing at a later bona fide advancement — and the signed copy has to reach the employee within 30 days after termination, a departure-stage deadline, not a signing-day one.

Oregon added a second layer in 2025.

Under ORS 653.297 — Senate Bill 951 — a non-compete that restricts the practice of medicine or nursing is void and unenforceable between a "medical licensee" and any person, a management services organization, or a hospital or hospital-affiliated clinic, subject to narrow exceptions.

"Any person" includes a private group practice like yours.

Who counts as a medical licensee.

Oregon SB 951 defines the term as an individual licensed in Oregon to practice medicine, as a nurse practitioner, as a physician associate, or to practice naturopathic medicine.

For a behavioral health employer, that means your psychiatrists, psychiatric nurse practitioners and physician associates hired as prescribers are inside the ban.

It reaches back.

The ban applies to agreements with medical licensees entered into before, on or after June 9, 2025 — the effective date of chapter 295, Oregon Laws 2025, as modified by HB 3410 — so agreements you signed years ago are covered, not just new ones.

Who it does not cover.

The ban does not reach licensed professional counselors, clinical social workers, marriage and family therapists, psychologists, behavior analysts or RNs, because none is a medical licensee.

Their non-competes stay under the general ORS 653.295 checklist.

The narrow exceptions.

A non-compete with a medical licensee can still be enforceable under ORS 653.295 where the licensee owns 1.5% or more of the entity; where a professional medical entity documents a "recruitment investment" and the term runs no more than 5 years from hire if the licensee provides clinical care in a health professional shortage area county, or 3 years otherwise; or where the licensee does not directly provide clinical care.

Whether a behavioral health group that is not a "professional medical entity" can use the recruitment-investment exception for a psychiatric NP is not settled by the sources behind this page — get employment counsel's read before relying on it.

Related paperwork.

ORS 653.297 also voids most nondisclosure and nondisparagement agreements between a medical licensee and a management services organization, hospital or hospital-affiliated clinic, with exceptions for licensees who have already left and for negotiated settlements — though the exception for former licensees does not cover a good-faith report of a legal violation.

If your group operates as an MSO or a hospital-affiliated clinic, this reaches your prescriber paperwork too.

In Oregon, two of the usual common-law questions have statutory answers; the statute leaves the third to drafting.

Time.

Capped.

The term of an Oregon non-compete may not exceed 12 months from the date of termination, and any longer remainder is void.

Legitimate business interest.

Built in as a validity condition: the employer must have a protectable interest, such as access to trade secrets or competitively sensitive confidential information.

A covenant with nothing protectable behind it fails no matter how narrowly it is drafted.

Area.

The six statutory conditions — offer notice, exempt status, salary, protectable interest, the signed copy and the 12-month cap — contain no mileage formula or radius limit, so territorial scope is a drafting question rather than something the statute prescribes.

Draw it no wider than the interest you can actually defend, and have Oregon employment counsel review the wording.

Time and money for everyone else.

If the employee is non-exempt or below the threshold, the only route runs through ORS 653.295(7): a written commitment to pay, for the time the employee is restricted, the greater of 50% of the employee's annual gross base salary and commissions or 50% of the inflation-adjusted threshold, for up to 12 months.

That is a real, recurring cost on a practice budget, so decide deliberately which roles — if any — justify funding it.

The statutory checklist does not reach non-solicits.

ORS 653.295's notice, salary and 12-month rules do not apply to a covenant not to solicit the employer's employees or not to solicit or transact business with the employer's customers — the statute's word for the clients a behavioral health practice serves.

A client or employee non-solicitation clause is therefore not gated by the salary threshold, the two-week offer notice or the 12-month cap the way a non-compete is.

It is not a blank check either: whether a particular clause is otherwise reasonable remains a common-law question, and this page's research found no Oregon appellate decision on a therapist client non-solicit.

Keep the clause narrow — the clients the clinician actually worked with, for a limited period — and have employment counsel read it before it goes into your template.

How these clauses are treated in other states, and how the ethics codes your clinicians answer to handle client transitions when they leave, is its own topic — see our guide to non-solicitation clauses.

Oregon gives you fewer covenant options than the form files suggest, so spend the effort where the law leaves room.

• Protect trade secrets directly. ORS 653.295(6) preserves your right to protect trade secrets and other proprietary information by injunction or any other lawful means, whatever the non-compete rules. That is the lane for genuinely confidential material — limit who can reach it and document what it is.
• Fix the offer workflow. The written offer must be received at least two weeks before the first day; the only second chance is signing at a later bona fide advancement. Build the disclosure into your offer template and calendar the timing.
• Calendar the 30-day delivery. A signed copy of the agreement has to reach the employee within 30 days after termination. Put it on the departure checklist.
• Recruit prescribers without a covenant. Outside the narrow exceptions, ORS 653.297 leaves your psychiatrists and psychiatric NPs free of a non-compete once they leave. If you think the recruitment-investment exception fits your hire, get counsel's read first.
• Use the right tool for training spend. Recouping supervision or training costs is a training repayment agreement's job, and it carries rules of its own that this page does not cover — see our guide to training repayment agreements.
• Compete on what a covenant cannot hold. Pay, supervision quality and schedule are terms you control; a void clause controls no one.

Whatever the package, have employment counsel who practices in Oregon read the final wording before an offer goes out.