According to the AMA MedEd Update, these include:

* The Task Force on Sources of Evidence Pilot Project, which will ask faculty to disclose the source(s) of each of their clinical recommendations so participants can later look up the references for themselves.

* THe Association of American Medical Colleges’ Learning from Teaching Pilot Program, which will document the work that goes into teaching residents and medical students in a clinical setting to help determine how best to award AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™ to physician faculty members who do this sort of teaching.

* The third, proposed by The Mayo Clinic, will look at if, when, and how AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™ should be awarded for physicians who create new clinical guidelines or adapt existing guidelnes.

I’d say it means we need to stay the course we’ve been on since the Act was first passed: Get informed about the Sunshine Act provisions and how they could affect your business. For CME providers, this article can help. For pharma folks, here’s something to get you started. Of course, everything could shift again after November, but for now, it looks like we need to keep on moving forward as if all the act’s provisions will be put into play on schedule.

Thanks in advance for your help!

I don’t know why, but somehow over the past few days at the CME Congress I have found myself several times saying things along the lines of, but there’s still a need to pass along knowledge, even if it doesn’t result in behavior change. And I do believe there is, because that’s where behavior change starts—you can’t do better if you don’t know better. But, of course, just because you know better doesn’t mean you will do better. There are further steps you usually have to take, and all kinds of reasons (both within and without your control) that can prevent you from making that change.

Behavior change usually is a multi-step process, but you do have to start somewhere, and often that somewhere is learning, even if it doesn’t immediately lead to anything else. I don’t think anyone struggles with that. It’s keeping the process moving so learning does eventually become action that can be difficult, right?

First up was Dr. Charles Boelen, former coordinator of the World Health Organization’s program of human resources for health and current health systems consultant. He talked about the changing world today’s healthcare professional works in, from demographic changes and environmental shifts to the economic whirlwind we’ve been adapting to lately, the growth of globalization, and need for more transparency.

It was interesting that he called a systems approach that shows a progression from medical education to improved practice to an improved healthcare system that will in turn benefit society as a whole “a bit naive.” But he’s right, it’s not that linear a process. And it is backward to start from education and move up, rather than start with the societal needs and move backward to figuring out how to design education that will help address those needs.

Key quote: “We’ve been educating for decades, and only now are asking what for.”

And the biggest of those societal needs that make up the “what for,” he said, were relevance, equity so all can benefit (he pointed to a 20-year difference in life expectancy between people who live in different parts of London as an example of current inequity), quality, and cost-effectiveness.

And there are lots of strategic opportunities for CPD, he said, including:

* Improve the performance of academic institutions.

* Participate in designing and testing new strategies

* Create new synergies with key stakeholders

One interesting point he made is that we tend to confuse medicine with health: Medicine only addresses about 10 percent of our health issues; the other 90 percent is due to things including social and environmental factors. “We have to work on preventing illness,” he said, not just curing disease.

It was a good overview, and a good way to kick off the meeting, I thought.

On the don’t side is Stephen Lewis, MA, CCMEP, president of Global Education Group and a regular Medical Meetings columnist. Here’s a video he posted to his company’s video blog that outlines why he thinks we need to be careful not to fall too in love with the shiny new social media toys. (Watch for his column in the June issue for more.)

On the more pro-social-media-in-CME side we have Derek Warnick, who posted a response video outlining why he feels there is a valid role for social media in CME.

I’d guess it’s no secret that I lean more toward Derek’s line of thought than Stephen’s, especially in that I don’t think anyone is really saying that social media will replace other formats for CME, especially not face-to-face education, and that there are a lot of ways we can and likely should be taking advantage of the technology.

But, while I haven’t seen it happen in the CME arena, I have seen other types of educational activities make the mistake of using social media just because they can, not because it provides another way to help their learners learn.

As with anything else, social media is only useful to the extent that it can be be used to meet the goals and objectives of the activity and achieve the outcomes you set out to achieve. As Stephen points out, it is just the medium, a tool, not the message.

So, what do you think? Leave a comment or drop me a line.

P.S. I’ll be attending the Global Alliance for Medical Education annual conference and the CME Congress 2012, both in Toronto, later this month. I hope to see you there!

Calculating Effect Size for Your Activities, in which Jason introduces us to the concept of Cohen’s d, and how it can help slice and dice all that outcomes data into something you can use.

Calculating Effect Size, Part II, in which Jason applies Cohen’s d to a real-life example and gave some hints on how to interpret the results.

Effect size, Part III: Putting It All Together, in which he shows how you can use effect size data to demonstrate the effectiveness of your CME program, thereby meeting the ACCME’s accreditation Criterion 11.

What, More About Effect Size?. Just when you thought there was nothing more to say on the topic, Jason talks about how to apply Cohen d to other scenarios.

Even math-phobics like me can follow along!

The ABCs of Accredited CME, which offers 10 short modules (most less than a half hour) on everything from who all the players are in the CME game to educational formats to PI-CME and, of course, ensuring your activities are fair and balanced. Developed by the American Academy of Dermatology and The France Foundation, both ACCME-accredited providers, the idea, according to the Web site, is “to clarify that the intent of the ‘rules’ is that accredited CME be based on the principles of adult learning and be independent of industry influence.” It was easy to sign up for, and it looks like it’s free of charge. I know what I’ll be doing this weekend!