Prescribed Credit Eligibility Requirements

Prescribed credit may be obtained for CME activities designed primarily for physicians. The content must relate directly to patient care, patient care delivery, or certain non-clinical topics. A family physician who is an Active, Supporting, or Life AAFP member must be directly involved in the planning of the activity to ensure the relevance of the content to the specialty of family medicine. Attestation is required on the CME application.

To be eligible for Prescribed credit, the content of a CME activity must satisfy one or more of the following criteria:

Have a direct bearing on patient care. The clinical content of CME must be based on one of the following in order to be eligible for Prescribed credit:
1. Current, best research evidence integrated with clinical expertise and patient values (Evidence-based, EB)
2. Customary and generally accepted (CGA) medical practice
3. Neither EB nor CGA, but not dangerous or proven ineffective. For a CME activity to be eligible Prescribed credit under this criterion the following additional guidelines must be followed:
  1. The content must be presented in a manner that is primarily intended to inform physicians about the treatment options so that they may engage in a meaningful discussion with patients.
  2. The content must not be delivered in a manner that is intended to instruct the physician on the practical application of the content.
  3. The presentation must offer a balance explanation of potential benefits and risks.
  4. Greater than 50% of the total activity content meets the eligibility criteria for AAFP CME credit.
Have a direct bearing on family physicians' ability to deliver patient care. These topics include, but are not limited to, the following:
1. Laboratory regulations
2. Managed care/practice management*
3. Utlilization review/quality assurance
4. Coding
Relate to selected non-clinical topics, including, but not limited to the following:
1. Teaching, ethical, medico-legal and/or social responsibilities of the family physician.
2. Faculty development
3. Professional and/or academic leadership
4. Physician-patient relations
5. Communications
Computer activities that have content related to patient care, patient care delivery, or selected non-clinical topics as described above.
Viewing of hosted technical or scientific exhibits or poster sessions.

*NOTE: The AAFP Commission on Continuing Professional Development (COCPD) considers practice management topics to be important for all aspects of a physician's medical practice. These topics may vary with geographic location and socioeconomic trends in a given area. Maintaining a viable, cost-effective, efficient practice is vital. Physicians must be informed of the broader aspects of the "business of medicine" in order to be accountable to their patients and to maintain a viable practice.

View a listing of activities that are NOT eligible for AAFP CME credit.