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

Rhode Island answers the question by employee group.

The state's Noncompetition Agreement Act makes a non-compete unenforceable against four categories of worker, which covers the hourly, overtime-eligible side of a behavioral health roster.

Two profession-specific statutes then void practice restrictions outright for psychiatrists and, since June 17, 2024, psychiatric nurse practitioners hired as APRNs.

Student interns, short-term student employees and workers 18 or younger are also outside a non-compete's reach.

Client and employee non-solicits and confidentiality agreements sit outside the Act — though the psychiatrist and APRN statutes void patient non-solicits separately, covered below.

How Rhode Island compares with other states — including any that write bans naming behavioral health licenses — is national context: see our guide to non-competes nationally.

Rhode Island's rule is statutory.

The Noncompetition Agreement Act, Rhode Island General Laws chapter 28-59, enacted in 2019, lists in § 28-59-3 the workers a non-compete cannot be enforced against: an employee classified as non-exempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act, a student intern or short-term student employee, an employee age 18 or younger, and a low-wage employee.

The low-wage definition is in § 28-59-2: average annual earnings — counting pay for the first 40 hours a week and excluding overtime, Sunday and holiday rates — of no more than 250% of the HHS federal poverty level for an individual.

This page does not compute that dollar figure; check the current federal poverty guideline for one individual and apply the 250% test before relying on a covenant with a lower-paid salaried hire.

One feature of the Act matters after the fact: an unenforceable non-compete does not render the rest of the contract void.

Under § 28-59-3(b) the remainder of the agreement survives — your confidentiality, nondisclosure and other provisions do not fall with the covenant.

What the federal government did or did not do about non-competes, and how Rhode Island compares with other states, is national context: see our guide to non-competes nationally.

Two Rhode Island statutes reach physicians and APRNs specifically.

Rhode Island General Laws § 5-37-33, enacted in 2016, voids any restriction on a licensed physician's right to practice medicine — including geographic non-competes and bans on treating or soliciting the employer's current patients — except in the sale of a physician practice, where a covenant of up to five years is allowed.

That covers the psychiatrists on your staff.

Since June 17, 2024, § 5-34-50 has done the same for advanced practice registered nurses: it voids geographic restrictions and bans on treating or soliciting current patients, and it covers psychiatric nurse practitioners hired as APRNs.

The sale-of-practice exception matches: the bans do not apply to the purchase and sale of a practice if the covenant lasts no more than five years.

This research found no behavioral health equivalent in the licensing chapters it checked.

The chapter indexes for mental health counselors and MFTs, psychologists, social workers, behavior analysts and physician assistants — Rhode Island General Laws chapters 5-63.2, 5-44, 5-39.1, 5-86 and 5-54, read in October 2026 — list no restrictive-covenant section, and this research found no 2025–2026 Rhode Island law adding one.

Treat that as a research finding, not a guarantee: a legislature can change it, so confirm with counsel before relying on it.

For those licensees, the general Act and Rhode Island common law are what is left — the next section.

Whether other states name behavioral health licenses in their bans is national context: see our guide to non-competes nationally.

Start with what the sections of the Act this page read — §§ 28-59-2 and 28-59-3 — do not contain: a maximum duration or a mile radius.

For the workers in § 28-59-3's four categories that is moot — the covenant is unenforceable however narrowly it is drawn.

For psychiatrists and APRNs the practice restriction is void.

The hard question is the one left over: the salaried, exempt clinician above the low-wage line.

For that group, no Rhode Island statute this research found supplies the enforceability test, and this page's research did not cover the common-law rules — neither the reasonableness test for time, geography and legitimate business interest, nor whether a court will rewrite an overbroad covenant rather than throw it out.

Treat both as open questions for Rhode Island employment counsel, not as settled rules.

The drafting discipline still helps.

Write a duration matched to the interest you are protecting, a geography limited to where this clinician actually worked or served clients, and a scope tied to the work they did for you — then write down what you would actually lose if they left and opened a practice across town.

An overbroad covenant is the easiest version for the other side to attack.

One more piece of § 28-59-3(b): even where the covenant itself is unenforceable, a Rhode Island court can still impose a non-competition restriction as a remedy for breaching another agreement or a statutory or common-law duty.

The Act limits the clause, not every duty you can enforce.

Rhode Island's Act carves non-solicits out of its own definition: § 28-59-2 excludes covenants not to solicit or hire employees and covenants not to solicit or transact business with customers, clients or vendors.

Those clauses therefore sit outside § 28-59-3's limits for most of a behavioral health roster, and nondisclosure and confidentiality agreements are excluded too.

Two limits on that.

First, the carve-out is from the Act, not from judicial review — this page's research covered Rhode Island's non-compete statutes, not how its courts scrutinize non-solicitation clauses, so have counsel review scope and duration.

Second, the carve-out does not reach the physician and APRN statutes: § 5-37-33 and § 5-34-50 void bans on a psychiatrist's or APRN's right to treat or solicit the employer's current patients.

A patient non-solicit is not a workaround for those two hires.

A non-solicit binds the clinician who signed it — restricting their solicitation of your clients or your staff.

What the ethics codes expect when a clinician departs is covered in our guide to non-solicitation clauses.

Classify before you draft.

The first question for any Rhode Island hire is FLSA status, not job title: an hourly, overtime-eligible RBT, behavioral health technician, case manager or clinician cannot be held to a non-compete, and neither can a hire whose average annual earnings sit at or below 250% of the federal poverty level for an individual.

Put the covenant in those offers anyway and it is dead weight.

For psychiatrist and PMHNP hires, spend the effort on the provisions that do not depend on a covenant.

Rhode Island's Act preserves agreements barring an employee from sharing the employer's trade secrets even after employment ends, and it leaves confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements outside its limits.

Have counsel confirm how those provisions interact with the prescriber statutes before you rely on them.

For the rest of the roster, a properly scoped client or employee non-solicit plus a confidentiality agreement do much of the work a non-compete was reaching for.

If the worry is money rather than competition — training you paid for, supervision you underwrote — a training repayment agreement is a different tool with its own rules; see our guide to training repayment agreements before adding one to an offer.

Keep the sale-of-practice window in mind, too: if you are buying or selling a practice, Rhode Island's statutes leave room for a covenant — up to five years with a physician or APRN, and the Act's limits do not cover a non-compete signed by a significant owner selling a business who receives significant consideration for it.

Either way, have Rhode Island employment counsel read the final wording before it goes into an offer.