South Carolina Nurse Practitioner CE Requirements

• Licenses renew every 2 years (biennial).

• For the underlying RN/APRN license, competency must be demonstrated by one of several options each biennium.
  • 30 contact hours of CE, OR
  • Current national certification/recertification, OR
  • Employer certification of competency, OR
  • Completion of an academic program
• APRNs must maintain current national certification in their role/specialty, which typically satisfies the competency option.
• The binding recurring hour requirement for prescribers is the pharmacotherapeutics CE below.

• 20 contact hours of pharmacotherapeutics education within the 2 years preceding renewal, required to renew prescriptive authority (S.C. Nurse Practice Act §40-33-34(F)).
• Initial applicants face different requirements.
  • New prescriptive-authority applicants: 45 hours of pharmacotherapeutics (15 in controlled substances)
  • Applicants already holding prescriptive authority in another state: 20 hours (15 in controlled substances)

• For APRNs with controlled-substance prescriptive authority, 2 of the 20 biennial pharmacotherapeutics hours must relate to prescribing controlled substances (§40-33-34, as amended in 2018).
• The Board accepts ACCME-, ACPE-, AAFP-, AANP-, and ANCC-approved providers for these hours.

• The 2018 practice-act overhaul (Act 234) set the 20-hr/2-yr pharmacotherapeutics + 2-hr controlled-substances structure (§40-33-34(E)-(F)).
• Applies to PMHNPs the same as other NPs; pharmacotherapeutics CE should be relevant to the APRN's practice area.
• South Carolina is an NLC state for RN licensure; APRN recognition and prescriptive authority are SC-specific.

Official sources