We push CME from Ethos to ACCME and our accrediting Board. How are others handling it when people request an extension to claim CME after the opportunity has closed in the LMS? Are you able to grant an extension, if so, what are the steps to do this?
We technically could do this since we only gave them 5 weeks to claim credit. However, I’m not sure if there will be system barriers, (LMS, ACCME, or Board) that will prevent it if I change the start/end dates and then try to change them back later to a date that already occurred.
Hi Tarah, for us it depends on the activity. Larger symposia will have longer deadlines, RSS activities will have shorter deadlines. If requested we may offer an extension based on the activity and the person. We don’t want to make a habit of it, we just don’t have the staff power to have this be a usual thing, but when we do offer an extension we tell them after the extension expires, they will no longer be able to complete the CME requirements.
I do want to add though, that this solves/poses a problem for us. We get these requests mainly because for us RSS activities do not disappear from a user’s task list if they haven’t completed the requirements, so they see the activity (maybe even a year after it expired) and ask to get access to complete the forms for their credits.
At that point, if they have many activities that expired but are pending, we wipe the ones from previous reporting years and ONLY extend the ones from the current year. Even then, everything has to be done manually so we don’t lose their record for the activity. We have to first remove the activity ID from the session so it doesn’t report their credit, manually complete the activity for the user, delete the credit assigned, then add the activity ID number back to the session. It’s a pain.
Thank you Gabriela! This is helpful to know this is a pain point for others. For us, it is a closed course, so only attendees are receiving a link to earn CME. It would be an even bigger pain the course was in our catalog. Thanks again for your insights.
