CHC, or Certified in Healthcare Compliance, is an individual professional certification administered by the Health Care Compliance Association (HCCA) through its accreditation arm, the Compliance Certification Board (CCB)®. It is the flagship, general-scope credential in the HCCA/CCB family — the one built around enterprise-wide healthcare compliance (billing and coding, HIPAA, fraud-and-abuse law, corporate compliance program administration) rather than a specialized slice of it. That general scope is exactly where the confusion starts: a research administrator searching “certified in healthcare compliance” is often actually looking for CHRC (Certified in Healthcare Research Compliance), the research-specific sibling credential, not CHC itself. This guide covers what CHC actually tests, who it fits, and how to tell it apart from CHRC, CHPC, and CPCO before you register for the wrong exam.
What the CHC credential covers
CHC certifies competency in running a general healthcare compliance program — the kind of program built around the OIG’s seven elements of an effective compliance program and applied across an entire hospital, health system, physician group, or payer organization. Its subject matter centers on billing and coding integrity, the federal fraud-and-abuse framework (the False Claims Act, the Anti-Kickback Statute, and the Stark Law), HIPAA privacy and security at a program level, and the administrative mechanics of a compliance office: risk assessment, auditing and monitoring, policy development, and workforce training and discipline.
It is deliberately not specific to any one care setting, department, or regulatory niche. That breadth is the point of CHC and also the reason CCB offers narrower siblings for professionals whose compliance work is concentrated in one area — research (CHRC), privacy (CHPC), or physician-practice billing (CPCO).
Who pursues CHC
CHC is aimed at compliance officers, compliance analysts, and internal auditors working across a hospital or health system’s whole compliance function, not at professionals whose role is confined to a single program area. Within a research administration office specifically, CHC is less commonly the first credential pursued than CHRC, because CHRC’s domain content maps directly onto research billing, human subjects protection, and grants compliance, while CHC’s maps onto enterprise billing and fraud-and-abuse controls that sit outside a typical research compliance office’s day-to-day scope. CHC becomes relevant to research-compliance staff mainly when the role spans both institution-wide compliance and research compliance, or as a broader credential pursued alongside CHRC by someone aiming at an institution-wide compliance leadership track.
Eligibility requirements
Per CCB’s published eligibility criteria (reported consistently across CCB-affiliated exam-prep resources, since CCB’s own eligibility page returned a access-blocked response during verification and could not be fetched directly), candidates must demonstrate at least one year of full-time healthcare compliance work, or 1,500 hours of direct compliance activity within the preceding two years. Applicants must also complete 20 CCB continuing education units (CEUs) before sitting the exam, at least 10 of which must come from live training events, earned within the year preceding the application.
Exam format and domains
The CHC exam is reported as a two-hour, 120-question exam administered at a proctored testing center. It is organized around the same seven-domain framework CCB uses across its individual credentials — Standards, Policies, and Procedures; Compliance Program Administration; Screening and Evaluation; Communication, Education, and Training; Monitoring, Auditing, and Internal Reporting; Enforcement, Discipline, and Incentives; and Investigations and Remedial Measures — applied to enterprise-wide healthcare compliance rather than to a research-specific, privacy-specific, or physician-practice-specific slice of it. (For comparison, CASRAI’s CHRC guide covers how those same seven domain names are applied to a research compliance program, including CHRC’s third-party-reported domain weightings.)
Recertification
CHC is reported to require recertification every two years, via 40 CCB CEUs, at least 20 of which must come from live training events. CCB opens the recertification application window in the months before a credential’s expiration date. As with initial eligibility, treat the exact current CEU thresholds and window length as subject to confirmation directly against CCB’s own certification portal at the time of application, since program requirements are revised periodically and HCCA’s certification page could not be independently fetched during this guide’s preparation.
CHC vs. CHRC vs. CHPC: how to tell them apart
All three are HCCA/CCB credentials that share the same seven-domain exam framework and the same CEU-based recertification model. What differs is scope — which part of a healthcare organization’s compliance exposure each one is built to test.
| Dimension | CHC | CHRC | CHPC |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Certified in Healthcare Compliance | Certified in Healthcare Research Compliance | Certified in Healthcare Privacy Compliance |
| Primary scope | Enterprise-wide compliance: billing/coding, fraud-and-abuse law, HIPAA at a program level | Research compliance: human subjects protection, research billing, conflicts of interest, grants management | Privacy compliance: HIPAA privacy and security operations specifically |
| Typical holder | Health system or hospital compliance officer/analyst | Research compliance officer, IRB-adjacent compliance staff | Chief privacy officer, HIPAA privacy/security officer |
| Issuing body | CCB (HCCA) | CCB (HCCA) | CCB (HCCA) |
| Exam structure | Seven-domain framework, enterprise context | Same seven domains, research context | Same seven domains, privacy context |
| Recertification | Every 2 years, CEU-based | Every 2 years, CEU-based | Every 2 years, CEU-based |
A fourth sibling, CPCO (Certified in Healthcare Compliance — Physician Practice), narrows the same framework to physician-practice billing and coding compliance and is not covered in depth here since it is not typically weighed against a research-administration role.
See also CASRAI’s CHPC certification guide for the privacy-focused credential, and its coverage of two research-administration credentials outside the HCCA/CCB family that are frequently confused with this group: IRB certification (CIP), which certifies human-subjects protection program staff rather than compliance-office staff generally, and Regulatory Affairs Certification (RAC), a RAPS credential for regulatory-submission professionals rather than compliance officers.
Which credential should a research compliance professional pursue?
If the role is defined by research specifically — human subjects protection, research billing audits, investigator conflict-of-interest disclosure, grants compliance — CHRC’s domain content maps more directly onto the day-to-day work than CHC’s does, and is the more commonly pursued of the two among research compliance staff. CHC becomes the better fit when the role, or the career track being built toward, spans institution-wide compliance beyond research: enterprise billing integrity, fraud-and-abuse risk, and compliance program administration across a whole hospital or health system. Some professionals in senior research-compliance leadership roles that also carry institution-wide compliance responsibility hold both.
Frequently asked questions
Is CHC the same thing as CHRC?
No. Both are CCB credentials built on the same seven-domain framework, but CHC certifies general, enterprise-wide healthcare compliance competency, while CHRC certifies research-compliance-specific competency: human subjects protection, research billing, conflicts of interest, and grants management. A research compliance office role is more often matched to CHRC than to CHC.
Do I need CHC before I can pursue CHRC, CHPC, or CPCO?
No. CHC, CHRC, CHPC, and CPCO are independent credentials with their own eligibility requirements; none is a prerequisite for another. A candidate can go directly for the credential that matches their actual compliance scope.
How long does it typically take to become eligible for the CHC exam?
Eligibility is reported to require at least one year of full-time healthcare compliance work (or 1,500 hours of direct compliance activity within the prior two years) plus 20 CCB continuing education units completed in the year before applying, so timelines vary with how quickly a candidate accumulates both the work history and the CEUs.
Does CHC expire?
Yes. It is reported to require recertification every two years through CCB continuing education units, a portion of which must come from live training events, consistent with CCB’s recertification model across its credential family.
