DENVER — Health care professionals may earn Continuing Medical Education credit for any number of classes promoting “gender-affirming care,” but courses on its drawbacks are apparently a different story.
A class titled “Clinicians’ Perspectives on Mitigating Harms of Gender Affirming Care” had its CME credit withdrawn this week after the Accreditation Council on Continuing Medical Education raised concerns about its “content validity,” as shown in an email shared with The Washington Times.
“To not jeopardize our accreditation status with the ACCME, the decision has been made to withhold credit for this event,” said the Christian Medical and Dental Association, which had approved credit for the seminar, in a Tuesday email to the event organizer.
Dr. Travis Morrell, a senior fellow at Do No Harm, said the seminar will still proceed as planned Sunday at the Inverness Denver — but that doctors, nurses and others in attendance won’t earn CME credit as originally planned.
“My assumption is that someone probably contacted the ACCME,” Dr. Morrell told The Washington Times.
He said it was highly unusual for the ACCME, a nonprofit corporation that accredits CME providers, to review a course ahead of time, attributing the decision to what he described as pervasive ideological bias in the medical community.
“It appears there’s some kind of activist working inside the ACCME that blocked our educational credits,” Dr. Morrell said. “It shows that most of our medical associations have been captured by activist ideas.”
The Washington Times has reached out to the ACCME for comment.
The course is slated to be presented by a panel at the Rocky Mountain Summit on Safeguarding Children from Gender-Affirming Treatment, a one-day forum backed by organizations opposed to gender-transition drugs and surgeries for minors.
Sponsors include Do No Harm, the Colorado Parent Advocacy Network, Colorado Principled Physicians, Parents Defending Education, Parents United America, Our Duty, XX-XY Athletics, and the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.
The course will be presented by Dr. Miriam Grossman, a child psychiatrist and author; Dr. Michelle Stanford, a Colorado pediatrician; Candice Jackson, Department of Education deputy general counsel, and Manhattan Institute fellow Leon Sapir.
“Panelists will analyze data-driven research, expose the impact of activism on healthcare, and provide actionable strategies to protect children and uphold medical integrity,” said the promotional materials.
Nobody would be surprised if demonstrators turned out to protest the event. In fact, Dr. Morrell would be surprised if they didn’t.
“I think the activist pushback highlights how they see our event is dangerous for pediatric gender medicine, which I think is built on a house of cards,” he said.
🎟️Get your tickets today for the Rocky Mountain Summit on Safeguarding Children from Gender-Affirming Treatment!
Hear from leading medical, legal & policy experts alongside courageous families to discuss the harms of gender-affirming interventions.
🎟️ https://t.co/GEs9nGGjMl pic.twitter.com/RUVLijBIPX
— Colorado Parent Advocacy Network (@CPANColorado) April 3, 2025
In its email to Dr. Morrell, the CMDA said the ACCME had concluded that “the activity does not fully align with ACCME’s expectations for content validity — particularly the requirement to present a fair and balanced view of diagnostic and therapeutic options.”
Critics called the objection ironic, given that ACCME-affiliated organizations have offered CME credit in the past for classes such as “Gender Affirming Care 101: Providing Hormone Therapy.”
An ACCME-affiliated program called QueerCME bills itself as “everything you need to step up your practice in gender affirming medical care” and offers classes for credit such as “What the Heck is Cisnormativity?”
“Cisnormativity refers to the assumption that all people are cisgender,” said the course description. “This deeply embedded bias shapes how society — and healthcare systems — view gender, often marginalizing and invalidating transgender and gender diverse (TGD) individuals. Cisnormativity fuels healthcare discrimination and reduces access to quality, affirming care for TGD patients.”
Dr. Morrell said he didn’t blame CMDA for withdrawing the CME credit, saying the group had little choice if it wanted to keep its accreditation.
President Trump has signed executive orders countering the spread of gender ideology, including an order declaring that the federal government recognizes only two sexes, male and female, but Dr. Morrell said the culture shift has yet to reach the medical community.
“They’re doubling and tripling down,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what [officials] do federally. Our medical culture, the upper leadership, is fully bought into activism.”
