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The AOA’s CME program focuses on growing knowledge, refining skills and increasing awareness of osteopathic medicine.
Please note: CME Sponsors have one year from the completion date of an activity to report data, but must report all data by March 31, 2025, to be applied to the 2022-2024 CME Cycle.
The AOA Board of Trustees establishes accreditation policy for osteopathic CME sponsors. The Bureau of Osteopathic Education has been delegated authority by the AOA Board of Trustees to review standards and procedures for accreditation of osteopathic CME sponsors.
The AOA automatically recognizes AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™ as AOA Category 2 credit. The Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) providers that are sponsoring an AMA PRA Category 1™ program do not need to request pre-approval from the AOA to publicize that their programs will receive AOA Category 2 credit.
Likewise, the AOA recognizes the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) Prescribed and Elective credit as AOA Category 2 credit. Programs with AAFP Prescribed or Elective credit do not need to request pre-approval from the AOA to publicize that their programs will receive AOA Category 2 credit.
AOA-certified members may request that Category 2-A CME credit be recognized as Category 1-B CME credit when there are not equivalent courses available within the osteopathic profession. Submit a request to inquire about obtaining a conversion of credit.
Yes. When there is a live presentation, and/or it is simulcast to/from remote locations, it is eligible for AOA Category 1-A CME Credit.
NOTE: CME Sign-in is still required to ensure participation of the learner either with a live attendance roster or using a web-based sign-in feature or evaluation with an attendance code.
Yes. If attendees can interact with the faculty and receive immediate responses, it is eligible for AOA Category 1-A CME Credit.
No. A one-time, in-person or live stream via internet presentation is not an enduring activity. At the conclusion of the activity, like any in-person presentation, the experience is complete. It does not need to meet the requirements of an interactive enduring activity that qualifies for 1A credit.
Yes. There are three additional requirements.
Example: A CME presentation (recorded) is offered for one month as an interactive asynchronous/enduring activity with AOA 1-A credit. A content expert would need to be available to answer any questions received from learners for the month the presentation was offered PLUS one week after the presentation time ended.
NOTE: Questions from participants could be sent directly to the content expert or could be collected by a representative and then sent to the content expert for a response.
While it is true that “advertising of any type” must not be anywhere within accredited education materials, the manual is referring to advertising from an AOA-defined Commercial Interest, which is defined as “any entity producing, marketing, re-selling, or distributing health care goods or services consumed by, or used on, patients. The AOA does not consider sponsors of clinical service directly to patients to be commercial interests. A commercial interest is not eligible for AOA accreditation.” (see pages 4-6 and page 31 of the CME Accreditation Manual for CME Sponsors for glossary of definitions). Advertising from non-commercial interests does not fall within the scope of this requirement.
Compliant example: Advertising registering for your organization’s annual meeting.
Non-compliant example: An advertisement for a new device from a Pharma company.
Furthermore, a key point of this requirement identifies that advertising must not be “within accredited educational materials.” This can allow for advertising to occur as long as it is not during the education i.e. during a presentation, on a journal article that offers CME, through an eLearning module. Examples of ways that advertising is allowed are: a separate webpage dedicated to commercial support or a “virtual exhibit hall”, or an advertisement can be placed on an announcement email of the activity.
Yes, absolutely!
This is a hybrid activity – which could be consumed in three ways:
To qualify for AOA 1A credit, all regular live course requirements stand, and the on-demand component must be interactive and has additional requirements that must be met (page 10).
Those additional requirements for interactive online CME are:
NOTE: If this activity is available for an extended period, you must comply with the 90-day credit reporting requirement. Best practice would be to push your rosters to TraCME semi-regularly (e.g., weekly or monthly) so physicians find the credit on their reports in a timely fashion. But at a maximum, this would need to occur every three months to fulfill the reporting requirement.
AOA Category 1 CME sponsors can now submit activity completion data to TraCME for up to one year following completion of an activity, rather than the previous 90-day requirement. However, sponsors are encouraged to submit completion data to TraCME as soon as possible so that participants’ CME reports remain up to date.
Best practice would be to push your rosters to TraCME semi-regularly (e.g., weekly or monthly) or as soon as possible so that physicians’ CME reports remain up to date. This would need to occur at least once a year rather than the previous 90-day requirement.
The AOA no longer publishes a list of AOA numbers. If you need to look up an AOA number, you may do so in the TraCME portal, under the Physicians tab. There you may search the AOA database for AOA numbers. You may even look up osteopathic students.