NOTICE: New Interactive Ethics CE Requirement

Effective January 1, 2027, the Certification Commission for Healthcare Interpreters (CCHI) will implement a new continuing education (CE) requirement. Certificants will be mandated to complete 2 hours of interactive CE in healthcare interpreting ethics as part of their 32-hour CE requirement for certification renewal every 4-year cycle. 

This new requirement is designed to ensure that CCHI-certified interpreters remain current on evolving standards of practice, decision-making frameworks, and the real-world ethical challenges inherent to the profession. It reinforces the role of interpreters as integral members of the healthcare team who are held to the same high standards of professional conduct. The specific requirement for interactivity ensures that CE training on ethics moves beyond theory, equipping interpreters with the practical skills to respond thoughtfully and professionally in ethically complex situations.

CCHI will offer two free webinars on interactive ethics in 2026 to help certificants understand this requirement better. Stay tuned!

CCHI defines an Interactive Ethics CE training as meeting both content (ethics) and methodology (interactive) criteria.

Content of Ethics CE

To qualify as an ethics credit, a course or session must focus primarily on at least one of the following:

• Codes of Ethics or Standards of Practice
• Ethical Decision-Making Frameworks (e.g., communicative autonomy)
• Analysis of Real or Simulated Ethical Dilemmas
• Role boundaries and Advocacy (e.g., when to step in, when to step back)
• Confidentiality and Privacy (e.g., HIPAA-related scenarios)
• Conflict of interest, impartiality, and professionalism in interpreting
• Cultural mediation and its limits through an ethical lens
• Comparative Ethics (e.g., compare approaches to interpreter intervention in court and medical interpreting)

What Content Does Not Count Toward Ethics CE Credits?

Courses or workshops that do not focus on ethics for healthcare interpreters – even if related to interpreting or health care – would not qualify. 

Examples include:

• Medical terminology, anatomy, or disease-specific webinars
• Language proficiency courses or grammar refreshers
• General professional development (e.g., marketing, time management)
• Technology use (unless it’s tied directly to ethical challenges, like confidentiality with remote platforms)
• Cultural topics without a clear tie to ethical decision-making
• Interpreter skill-building without a clear tie to ethical decision-making
• Attending sessions on ethics of other professions (e.g., grand rounds, court or educational interpreting ethics)

Methodology of Interactive Ethics CE

To qualify for ethics CE credits, a course or session must be interactive – regardless of whether it is offered synchronously (live) or asynchronously (on-demand), in-person or virtually. Interactivity ensures that participants not only learn about ethical principles but also engage in practical application and decision-making that reflect real-world interpreting challenges.

An interactive ethics-focused course must include opportunities for participants to:

• Apply ethical frameworks to realistic scenarios or case studies 
• Make decisions based on presented dilemmas and justify their reasoning 
• Actively reflect on ethical principles and standards of practice (i.e., share their opinions and understanding with the instructor and/or other participants)

• Engage in structured activities, requiring participants to share their perspectives, opinions, and approaches, such as:
  
  • Whole group discussion, live polls or breakout rooms or small group discussions (for synchronous learning)
  • Discussion forums/boards or written reflections (for asynchronous learning)
  • Scenario-based simulations or roleplays, which are in-person, written or video-based, with prompts for response
  • Multiple-choice or open-ended quizzes that include scenario-based or critical thinking questions and instructor feedback (for asynchronous learning such feedback could consist of rationales for the correct answer and incorrect options)

What Methodology Does Not Count Toward Interactive Ethics CE Credits?

• Courses that consist solely of passive learning such as listening to a lecture, watching a video or reading an article without any opportunity to engage
• Attending an ethics panel without a meaningful audience participation (i.e., questions from the audience to the panelists do not meet CCHI’s criteria of interactivity)

• Presentation of content in a lecture format followed by questions from the audience (i.e., the usual Q&A part of a presentation does not meet CCHI’s criteria of interactivity)