Here’s another Q&A from yesterday’s session at the Alliance for CME conference:

Can a non-physician receive AMA PRA Category 1 credit for a CME activity?

1. Only if they’re listed as part of the invited audience.

2. Only if their governing body accepts Category 1 credit.

3. No.

The right answer is #2–AAFP and some nursing organizations also can accept Category 1 credit.

Here’s another one: Can a product manager or other marketing representative be present during a planning committee meeting?

No

Yes

Yes, if they contribute only information about their products.

The audience was pretty split on this one, with 44 percent saying no, 51 percent saying yes (just 5 percent picked the third option). A panelist representing a pharma company said his company leaves this up to the provider to make the call. “It wouldn’t be someone from the marketing department, though,” he said. “It would be someone who could verify that the data was correct.” There was some discussion about the difference between influence and control. An audience member noted that while ACCME says the provider must maintain control of the content, a pharma person’s presence could be construed as an influence over the content, just by being there. But element 1.1 of the Standards states pretty clearly that the issue is control. “The issue goes back to perception,” said one audience member. “Will the faculty be influenced by pharma being in the room? You have to have a policy so the perception of bias isn’t created by pharma being there.”