Free and local continuing medical education does not guarantee surgeon participation in maintenance of certification learning activities.

The American Board of Surgery has adopted the Maintenance of Certification requirement for surgeons. It requires continuous professional development (CPD) using active and passive learning modalities in contrast to traditional continuing medical education (CME). The Rural Trauma Team Development Course developed by the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma is a CPD learning activity. We provided 22 free courses between May 2007 and June 2009 to trauma care providers at 11 affiliated community and critical access hospitals. The course was taught on-site by an interdisciplinary group and at least one trauma surgeon was faculty. Free Category I CME credits and continuing education units were provided. Two hundred thirty-four providers attended and the majority were RNs (60%) and emergency medical technicians (21.8%). Only 18 were physicians (7.7%) and none were surgeons. The majority felt that they would change their practice as a result of the course but cited the lack of attendance at the course by emergency physicians and surgeons as a deficit. It may be that surgeons have barriers such as time away from a practice to attending these newer types of educational opportunities. Those who develop and offer these courses may need to develop different strategies to reach this target audience.