3.3 Continuing Competence Requirements

Continuing Competence Requirements

R4-24-401 through R4-24-403 create the continuing-competence system. The Arizona Board does not preapprove individual activities. The licensee classifies each activity, keeps evidence and bears responsibility for meeting the rule.

Totals and category floors

Category A activities are approved for contact hours by a qualifying accredited medical, health care or PT education program; a qualifying national or state association or component; or a qualifying national medical, health care or PT specialty society. Category A may include all required hours.

The current rule does not impose a mandatory two-hour ethics or Arizona-jurisprudence course. Ethics, law, administration and reimbursement may qualify as practice-management or nonclinical subject matter within applicable categories and caps, but they are not a separate subject-matter minimum.

Nonclinical credit is limited. For a PT, no more than five Category A hours and no more than five combined Category B/C hours may be nonclinical. For a PTA, the corresponding limits are three Category A hours and two combined Category B/C hours.

Initial-license proration and compliance period

The compliance period runs from September 1 following issuance or renewal through August 31 of the next even-numbered year. A person initially licensed with no more than one year left in the period has a reduced, Category-A-only requirement: 10 Category A hours for a PT or 6 Category A hours for a PTA. Excess hours do not carry forward, and the same activity may not be claimed more than once.

Categories B and C

Category B includes qualifying study groups, self-instruction and in-service education related to practice. A study group requires at least three participants, and two hours of participation equal one contact hour. Study or self-instruction and in-service credit are subject to the subcategory limits stated in the rule.

Category C includes teaching or lecturing, practice-management activities, publications and clinical instruction. Sixty minutes of qualifying teaching or lecturing may yield 2.5 contact hours under the rule's conversion. Clinical instruction yields one contact hour per 120 hours of instruction. Apply the exact conversion before applying the overall B/C cap.

Attestation, audit, retention, and cure

At renewal, the licensee attests to compliance; certificates are not routinely attached. The Board may audit. The rule provides for the audit notice within 60 calendar days after the renewal deadline and requires the selected licensee to submit the requested evidence within 30 days. Evidence should identify the activity, date, category, approval body when relevant and contact hours.

The licensee retains documentation for two compliance periods. If an audit shows a deficiency, the rule allows a six-month period to complete the missing requirement. Making up the hours does not erase the initial noncompliance or permit the same hours to be counted in a later period. Failure to comply with continuing competence is a disciplinary ground under A.R.S. § 32-2044(24).

Activities that do not count

R4-24-403 excludes:

• regularly scheduled institutional educational opportunities such as rounds or case conferences;
• staff meetings;
• a publication or presentation directed to a lay or nonprofessional group; and
• routine teaching of personnel, students or staff as a job requirement.

The exclusion can control even when the subject is clinically useful. Credit depends on the regulatory category, not simply whether learning occurred.

Calculation example

A PTA reports six qualifying Category A clinical hours, three Category B hours and three Category C hours. Only four combined B/C hours can count, so the allowable total is ten. If the same PTA had only five Category A hours, the total would still fail the six-hour Category A floor even if many B/C hours were reported.

Official anchors

• Board continuing-competence overview
• Board renewal FAQ
• Arizona Administrative Code, R4-24-401 through 403

Category calculation drill

A PT completes eight Category A clinical hours, four Category A management hours, five Category B self-study hours and five Category C clinical-instruction hours. The total is 22, Category A is 12, nonclinical Category A is within its five-hour cap, and combined B/C is exactly ten, so 20 hours can count. If six of the Category A hours were nonclinical, one would be excluded; the PT would still need enough allowable hours after every floor and cap is applied.

An audit question should be solved in order: verify dates within the compliance period, remove repeats and excluded activities, apply each activity conversion, separate A from B/C, enforce nonclinical sublimits, enforce the A floor, and finally test the total. Counting raw certificates before category rules is the usual trap.

The Board may waive requirements for extreme hardship such as illness, disability, active military service or another extraordinary circumstance, but the licensee requests the waiver in writing and supplies supporting information. Hardship does not create an automatic self-declared exemption.