The ACOI is accredited by the American Osteopathic Association as a provider of continuing medical education. All AOA and ACOI members are required to meet specified CME credit hour requirements. Certified or board eligible osteopathic physicians must meet additional requirements related to their basic certification.
Except as indicated in the exemptions and reduction or waiver of requirements section below, AOA members are required to obtain a minimum of 120 CME credit hours for each 3-year calendar period. The current period ends 2012.
The requirements for 120 CME hours includes a minimum of 30 hours in AOA Category 1-A. The remaining 90 hours of the 120-hour requirement may be obtained by completing continuing medical education designated as Categories 1-A, 2-A, or 2-B credit. A maximum of 60 hours of Category 1-B preceptoring may be applied to the 120 hour requirement. Physicians who obtain 150 hours of CME in a 3-year CME cycle will be given a certificate of excellence in CME.
A maximum of 60 credit hours of the total requirement may be earned under Category 2, described below.
Certified Physicians—Physicians who are board certified or board eligible must earn a minimum of 50 credit hours in their primary specialty in each 3-year period. These hours may be earned in Category 1 or Category 2. Failure to maintain this requirement will result in loss of certification or board eligibility.
Physicians who are board certified or board eligible in more than one specialty will be monitored in the primary certification area of their most recently obtained certification unless they submit a formal request to be monitored in one other specialties. Physicians will be monitored in one specialty only.
A description of the four categories of AOA CME Credit follows:
Category 1-A Credit. AOA Category 1-A credits include formal educational programs that are designed to enhance clinical competence, improve patient care and are sponsored by an AOA-accredited CME sponsor. The ACOI Annual Convention, Internal Medicine Board Review and other clinical education programs offer category 1-A credit.
Formal Osteopathic CME. Formal face-to-face programs that meet the Category 1 Quality Guidelines and faculty requirements and are sponsored by AOA-accredited CME sponsors.
Osteopathic Medical Training. Delivery of formal osteoapthic medical education in a didactic format is eligible for Category 1-A credit on an hour-for-hour basis. Methods of such education would include: formal delivery of osteopathic medical education lectures in colleges of osteopathic medicine, and formal delivery of osteopathic medical education to students, interns, residents, and staff of AOA-approved healthcare facilities. Teaching credit must be submitted by the CME department of an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME college of osteopathic medicine or Category 1 CME hospital.
Category 1-B. Category 1-B credit may include: development and publication of scientific papers and electronically communicated osteopathic educational programs; serving as osteopathic healthcare facility and college accreditation approval inspectors or consultants; OPTI inspections, conducting and developing certifying board examinations and test construction committee work; participating on an osteopathic state licensing professional review board; and healthcare committee and departmental meetings which review and evaluate patient care whether the committee work is in an osteopathic or allopathic institution. Serving as a preceptor in any AOA-Approved osteopathic medical education program may be granted Category 1-B credit. A maximum of 60 hours of AOA Category 1-B preceptoring may be applied to the 120 hour requirements designated by the approved Category 1 college of osteopathic medicine. Fifteen hours of Category 1-B credit will automatically be awarded to AOA members who pass a recertification examination or obtain a certification of added qualifications. AOA Category 1-B credit may also be obtained through:
- Activities in Non-AOA-accredited Institutions. Category 1-B may be granted to osteopathic physicians who participate in a non-AOA-accredited institution/hospital, hospital staff activities, educational lectures, and lecturing when the institution/hospital is an AOA-recognized associate institution/hospital that trains osteopathic interns and/or residents. A non-AOA-accredited institution/hospital (or associate institution/hospital) is an institution/hospital that is directly associated with an OPTI for purposes of training osteopathic students, interns and/or residents. Accreditation of the hospital/institution by the healthcare facility accreditation program (HFAP) of the AOA is not required.
- Non-Osteopathic CME Programs. The AOA Council on Continuing Medical Education may recognize allopathic specialty or subspecialty programs for Category 1-B credit, when in the Council's opinion there are essentially no equivalent courses available within the osteopathic profession. These courses must be sponsored by an ACCME accredited provider. To request consideration of a non-osteopathic course for Category 1-B credit, write to the Division of CME at AOA Headquarters in Chicago and supply a copy of the printed program (or syllabus) and documentation of attendance.
- Reading the JAOA Journal and other Approved Journals. Osteopathic physicians can earn 2 hours of AOA Category 1-B credit for reading the JAOA and other journals approved by the CCME and passing the respective CME quiz by a minimum of 70 percent.
- Faculty Development Programs. Faculty development programs are granted Category 1-B credit if they are sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor and meet the 1-A faculty/hours requirement.
Category 2-A. Category 2-A includes formal educational programs that are ACCME-accredited, AAFP-approved, or programs sponsored by AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsors which do not meet the 1-A faculty/hours requirement for Category 1-A credit.
Category 2-B. Category 2-B credit includes the preparation and presentation of scientific exhibits at a county, regional, state, or national professional meeting (10 hours per scientific exhibit); home study; reading medical journals and viewing non-osteopathic medical video and audio tapes and cassettes; journal type CME on the internet; faculty development; physician administrative training; quality assessment programs; observations at medical centers; medical economics; CME programs on the internet; risk management programs that are administrative in nature; and programs dealing with experimental and investigative areas of medical practice. Five credit hours may be granted for reading medical textbooks. A copy of the home CME certification form is published monthly in the JAOA.
Risk management programs are granted Category 1-A credit if they are clinical in nature, sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor, and meet the 1-A faculty/hours requirement for AOA Category 1-A credit.
Risk management programs are granted Category 2-A credit if they are clinical in nature and are sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor but the 1-A faculty/hours requirement is not met; or sponsored by an ACCME-accredited organization; or an AAFP-approved program.
Risk management programs are granted Category 1-B credit if they are administrative in nature, and sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor. Risk management programs are granted Category 2-B credit if they are administrative in nature and are sponsored by an ACCME-sponsor or if the programs are AAFP-approved.
Managed care programs are granted Category 1-A if they are sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor and meet the 1-A faculty/hours requirement for AOA Category 1-A credit. Managed care programs are granted Category 1-B credit if they are sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor but the program does not meet the AOA Category 1-A faculty/hours requirement. Managed care programs are granted Category 2-A credit if they are sponsored by an ACCME-sponsor or if the programs are AAFP-approved. (The maximum of CME credits which may be earned for managed care courses is 5 hours per year with a total of 15 hours within any one three-year period.)
Osteopathic physicians may earn up to 30 percent of their Category 1-A requirement from internet CME (i.e., up to 9 hours of Category 1-A CME for members with a requirement of 30 hours of Category 1-A credit). Category 1-A Internet CME credit earned in excess of 9 hours will be applied to the Category 1-B and Category 2 CME requirements. Category 1-A credit will be awarded to real-time, interactive, simultaneous conferencing CME on the internet. The CME event must meet AOA quality guidelines, the 1-A faculty/hours requirement, and it must be sponsored by an AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsor. These courses would be considered live on the internet.
To be awarded credit for Internet CME, osteopathic phsycians must complete a CME quiz with a passing grade of 70 percent or better, and the sponsor of the program must provide this information to the AOA, along with the category and amount of CME credit that the sponsor believes the course should recieve.
What other types of Internet CME courses can receive CME credit?
Category 1-B credit may be awarded to audio and video programs on the internet sponsored by AOA-accredited Category 1 CME sponsors. These courses are typically programs a physician could view anytime - day or night - that are primarily audio and video CME events.
Category 2-A credit may be awarded to real-time, interactive CME programs on the internet that are produced by CME providers accredited by the Accreditation Council on Continuing Medical Education or courses approved by the American Academy of Family Physicians. These courses must be live on the internet.
Category 2-B credit may be awarded to journal-type CME on the internet that is produced by an AOA-accredited sponsor, ACCME sponsor, or a CME course approved by the AAFP. These courses are essentially static, textbook type programs. They may have hypertext jumps to help the reader pursue specific information.
The AOA Council on CME reserves the right to evaluate each CME Internet program and activity and to deny CME credits at its discretion.
CME credit may be granted enduring materials that meet the same requirements as "Faculty Development Programs" described above, i.e., that are sponsored by an AOA-accredited CME sponsor and provide a faculty of which 50 percent of the faculty/authors (1) at least 50 percent of the total educational hours are presented by osteopathic phsycians, or MD's, PhD's, or other professionals with graduate degrees who hold a full-time faculty appointment at a college of osteopathic medicine, or (2) at least 50 percent of the presenters are osteopathic physicians, or MD's, PhD's, or other professionals with graduate degrees who hold a full-time faculty appointment at a college of osteopathic medicine.
Such enduring materials can include printed monographs, audio-and-videotapes, CD-ROMS, archived online materials, and other electronic teaching aids, which are most often intended for CME self-study.
Credit will be awarded at the rate of one (1) credit per hour of direct participation if an accompanying CME quiz is completed with a passing grade of 70 percent, and the sponsor confirms this to the AOA.
Requests for certification of enduring materials is beside those planned an executed by an AOA-accredited CME sponsor should be submitted to the AOA Division of CME for review by the AOA Editor-in-Chief, who will make a recommendation to the Council on Continuing Medical Education. This process will ordinarily take approximately 30 days.