Virginia expands noncompete ban to health care professionals

Beginning July 1, 2026, Virginia joins more than 20 other states in barring or limiting the use of noncompete agreements with health care professionals.

After the state legislature accepted her recommended changes to the bill, Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed SB128 into law. It prohibits employers from entering or enforcing noncompete agreements with health care professionals.

The law defines health care professional more broadly than most state laws to include any person licensed, registered or certified by the Boards of Medicine, Nursing, Counseling, Optometry, Psychology or Social Work. The law provides an exception for noncompetes included as part of an agreement for the sale of a healthcare professional’s interest in a business.

The law preserves options for employers to protect investments in recruitment and training. Employers may require repayment from a departing health care professional who has been employed for fewer than five years for all or a prorated portion of recruitment-related costs, such as:

• Relocation expenses, signing or retention bonuses and other compensation used to induce a health care profession to relocate or establish a practice in a specific geographic area; and
• Recruiting, education or training expenses.

Nonsolicitation agreements permitted

The law also allows room for nonsolicitation agreements that prohibit a departing health care professional from soliciting or attempting to solicit the employer’s customers with whom the professional had material contact during employment.

However, nonsolicitation provisions may not interfere with patient choice and must permit a health care professional to inform patients they treated or consulted before their departure about the professional’s continued practice of medicine, new contact information and the patient’s right to choose a health care provider.