Complete 75 contact hours of continuing nursing education (or 150 continuing nursing education hours if you are doubling this category.) At least 50% of the hours must be from an educational program/organization accredited by American Nurses Credentialing Center or on the accepted list of organizations below. At least 51% of your continuing education hours must be related to your certification specialty.
Adult and Family Nurse Practitioners are required to use this category for one of their two professional development categories. They also have the option of doubling this category.
What counts?
Officially approved nursing continuing education contact hours accredited by American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) (e.g., seminars, workshops, conferences, and presentations that award contact hours). See our approved list of providers.
Nursing continuing education that is not officially approved may be used as long as the content is applicable to your area of certification (e.g., in-services, workshops, study modules, grand rounds offered by your place of employment).
Independent study that is approved for continuing education may be used for 100% of the contact hours required (e.g. home study programs, articles from journals, CME articles, other health discipline independent study modules).
Other health disciplines' continuing education hours may be used if the content is applicable to your area of certification (e.g. CME credits, social work, counselors, physical therapists). Continuing educations hours approved by any of these organizations will meet the ANCC-accredited CNE criteria (This list is not comprehensive.):
- American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP)
- American Academy of Nurse Practitioners (AANP)
- American Academy of Physician Assistants (AAPA)
- American College of Nurse-Midwives (ACNM)
- American Psychiatric Association (APA)
- American Psychiatric Nurses Association (APNA)
- American Psychological Association (APA)
- Emergency Nurses Association (ENA)
- National Association of Nurse Practitioners in Women's Health (NPWH)
- National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners (NAPNAP)
- Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) (includes CME)
- Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE) (includes CPE)
As needed, you can use these formulas to convert continuing education credit.
- 1 contact hour = 1 CME or 0.1 CEU or 60 minutes
- 1 CEU = 10 contact hours