Nutrition CME Is Coming to More Physician Licenses

A quiet trend is spreading across state medical boards: physicians are being asked to complete a small amount of continuing medical education (CME) specifically on nutrition and metabolic health. Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, and West Virginia have all moved in this direction over the past year, and New York offers a voluntary version. None of these adds a heavy burden — but the details differ by state, and several are still being finalized through board rulemaking.

Why nutrition CME, and why now

These changes ride a broader movement — sometimes described as lifestyle medicine, metabolic health, or “food as medicine” — that emphasizes the role of diet in preventing and managing chronic disease. Several of the new requirements arrived as part of wider state health laws. A common rationale cited by supporters is that physicians receive relatively little dedicated nutrition training in medical school. Whatever your view of that argument, the practical result for licensees is the same: a small, topic-specific CME added to license renewal.

Louisiana: at least one hour every four years

Louisiana acted first among this group. Act 463 of 2025 (Senate Bill 14), signed June 20, 2025, requires physicians and physician assistants across a broad range of specialties — and advanced practice registered nurses in primary-care fields such as family medicine, internal medicine, pediatrics, and obstetrics and gynecology — to complete at least one hour of continuing education on nutrition and metabolic health every four years. The specific content is left to the licensing board to determine through rulemaking. Physicians who have, within the past year, been certified or recertified by a member board of the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) or a specialty board recognized by the American Osteopathic Association (AOA) are exempt.

Texas: first in the nation, rules still being written

Texas Senate Bill 25, signed June 22, 2025 and effective September 1, 2025, has been described as the first state law in the country to require nutrition education for health professionals. It directs the Texas Medical Board to adopt rules setting both the number of hours and the content of a nutrition and metabolic-health CME, drawn from guidelines developed by a newly created Texas Nutrition Advisory Committee. The board must adopt those rules no later than December 31, 2026, and the requirement applies to license renewal applications filed on or after January 1, 2027. Because the hours are to be set by board rulemaking, they are not final yet — though the Texas Medical Association has said physicians should expect a biennial requirement.

New Mexico: one hour per three-year cycle

The New Mexico Medical Board has added a dedicated one-hour nutrition CME to its renewal cycle, effective July 1, 2026. New Mexico physicians renew on a three-year (triennial) cycle and already complete 75 hours of CME per cycle, including one hour reviewing the state’s Medical Practice Act and board rules; the new nutrition hour is added to that framework.

West Virginia: nutrition folded into biennial CME

In its 2026 regular session, the West Virginia Legislature passed House Bill 4951, which amends the state code so that the continuing medical education required to renew a license must include nutrition. It applies to both MDs and DOs, whose West Virginia licenses renew on a two-year (biennial) cycle. The bill leaves the number of hours and other specifics to board rulemaking. A Senate amendment clarified that new and renewing licensees would complete the nutrition education once, with ongoing updates as the Board of Medicine recommends.

New York: voluntary, not required

New York takes a different route. Rather than mandating nutrition CME, the state makes it available on a voluntary basis. Under a law enacted in 2023 and amended in 2024, the New York State Education Department, in consultation with the Department of Health, curates a Nutrition Resource Library of accredited nutrition coursework that physicians may take for CME credit but are not required to complete.

What to do now

If you hold a license in one of these states, there is nothing urgent to do today — but it is worth knowing the requirement is coming so it does not surprise you at renewal. We track renewal cycles, deadlines, and special-topic CME state by state, and keep these guides current as boards publish their rules: