Who Can Take the CMA (AAMA)® Exam?

Q. Who is eligible to take the CMA (AAMA)® Certification Exam?

A. The only individuals eligible to take the CMA (AAMA) Certification Exam and become CMAs (AAMA) are graduates or graduating students of medical assisting programs that fall within one of the following categories:

• Accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (CAAHEP)
• Accredited by the Accrediting Bureau of Health Education Schools (ABHES)
• Meets the criteria for the time-limited Certification Exam Eligibility Pilot Program

The Certification Exam Eligibility Pilot Program is a three-year pilot program, begun August 2019, that allows graduates of postsecondary (college-level) medical assisting programs to take the CMA (AAMA) Exam if the program meets certain requirements, including the program being part of an institution accredited by an accrediting body recognized by either the United States Department of Education (USDE) or the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA).

Hopeful exam candidates can gather all required documentation and submit their documentation for review—to see if they are eligible under the pilot program—for free online via the AAMA website.

NP Delegation in South Carolina: State Law Permits Nurse Practitioner Delegation to Medical Assistants

Conflicting information has been circulating about whether South Carolina nursing law permits licensed nurses—including advanced practice registered nurses (APRNs), such as nurse practitioners (NPs)—to delegate tasks to medical assistants.

Nevertheless, South Carolina law specifically authorizes licensed nurses, including NPs, to delegate certain nursing tasks to knowledgeable and competent unlicensed assistive personnel (UAP), such as medical assistants, who are working under appropriate nurse supervision.

Administration of medication, however, is a task licensed nurses cannot legally delegate to UAP (such as medical assistants) under South Carolina nursing law.

Review the supporting evidence in the January/February 2020 Public Affairs article, “NP Delegation in South Carolina,” on the AAMA website.

New Alaska Standards for Delegation of Certain Duties

The Alaska State Medical Board has added a new section to its regulations that establishes standards and conditions under which a licensed physician (doctor of medicine or osteopathic medicine), podiatrist, or physician assistant may delegate certain medical duties to unlicensed professionals such as medical assistants.

These regulations remove any ambiguity from the assertion that knowledgeable and competent unlicensed allied health professionals such as medical assistants can legally perform intramuscular (IM), subcutaneous (subq), and intradermal (ID) injections delegated by a licensed provider under the provider’s direct/on-site supervision.

The regulations of the Alaska State Medical Board were finalized November 25, 2019, and went into effect December 25, 2019.

You can read the regulations by either accessing the December 2019 medical statues and regulations document (Page 37) via the Alaska State Medical Board webpage or the Alaska section of the AAMA State Scope of Practice Laws webpage on the AAMA website.

This is a significant scope of practice victory in Alaska, and I congratulate the Alaska Medical Assistant Society for its excellent and diligent work on strengthening and clarifying medical assistants’ right to practice!

Medical Assistants and Vaccination Administration under Pharmacists

Improving vaccination rates and lessening vaccination hesitancy is a top priority for all health care professionals. Medical assistants are in a prime position to help, but the exact nature of their role requires some legal considerations.

Consider the following situation:

I own a pharmacy in which pharmacists administer influenza vaccinations. Could I hire a medical assistant to help us administer these influenza shots, or is it required that medical assistants work only under the supervision of a physician?

Most often, medical assistants work under the authority and supervision of licensed providers such as physicians (doctors of medicine or osteopathic medicine), nurse practitioners, and physician assistants in outpatient settings. However, state laws generally do not prohibit other licensed health care professionals (such as podiatrists, dentists, optometrists, and pharmacists) from employing medical assistants and delegating legally permitted tasks to them.

In response to your specific question, it is necessary to check the pharmacy practice act of your state—and the regulations and policies of the state board of pharmacy—to ascertain which allied health professionals (if any) may be delegated the administration of influenza vaccinations by a pharmacist. It is also necessary to determine the degree of supervision pharmacists must exercise over allied health professionals who are administering influenza vaccinations. I suspect the pharmacy law of your state requires delegating pharmacists to exercise on-site supervision over professionals who are administering influenza vaccinations.

If you’d like to know more about your specific state laws, visit the State Scope of Practice Laws webpage on the AAMA website.

The CMA (AAMA)® Certification Exam Eligibility Pilot Program

The Certifying Board (CB) of the American Association of Medical Assistants® (AAMA) has approved the launch of a three-year eligibility pilot program, which temporarily opens a new education pathway for medical assistants to become eligible to sit for the CMA (AAMA)® Certification Exam.

Applicants first submit their documentation for review, free of charge, to determine their eligibility to apply for the exam. The criteria and submission requirements for the review are outlined on the Eligibility Pilot Program webpage of the AAMA website.

Before implementing the program, the CB took into account several policy priorities, including but not limited to the following:

• Maintaining global and national accreditation standards
• Heeding a recommendation from the National Commission for Certifying Agencies
• Needing to collect and evaluate empirical evidence on examination performance by candidates who are not graduates of accredited medical assisting programs

Examine all the CB’s considerations and rationale in detail by reading the November/December 2019 Public Affairs article, “The CMA (AAMA)® Certification Exam Eligibility Pilot Program: Criteria and Rationale for the Three-Year Pilot Study,” on the AAMA website.