Unlocking free CME credits for advanced practice providers

I am working on earning my Category 1 CME requirements and am always looking for CME that is free or included in my professional memberships.

As a dermatology PA, I heavily rely on the Society of Dermatology PAs for a significant portion of my CME credits, given the relevance of their topics to my daily practice.

However, I still like learning about other topics in the spectrum of primary care, so I am on the hunt for primary care CME that I don’t have to pay for.

What I have found so far:

Medscape:  medscape.org
Pros – Lots of topics across many specialties
Cons – Many courses are only 0.25 to 0.5 credits; when I’ve used Medscape’s CME in the past, it has taken forever to accumulate the number of credits I need

Free CME:  freecme.com
Pros – Many courses available, and many where one can earn full CME credits; the program is “conference-like,” in which you listen to lectures and complete a survey about the lecture afterward
Cons – Users need to create an account before using (not a huge deal); the first lecture I chose was a recording of a lecture from a CME conference, which wouldn’t be a big deal, but the lecture slides were difficult to read, and the lecturers’ voices were echoey; printing the certificate requires you to submit your state license number (again, not a huge deal, but seems like an unnecessary step)

StatPearls: statpearls.com/home/freecme
Pros – One can earn a full CME credit; the user reads the lesson at their own pace without listening to a drawn-out lecture; the test questions after the lesson were not difficult, but they did require one to think about the lesson – I actually felt like I learned and retained information
Cons – Users need to create an account; the test questions were lengthy descriptions of patient scenarios, so it definitely took some extra time to complete

Do you have any tips for earning free CME?  Please share!

Nikki Rataj Casady, DMSc, PA-C
email@appcolleague.org