Welcome to the June 2020 edition of AOE Compliance Connection, AOE’s monthly newsletter. This month, AOE’s newsletter includes three featured articles to keep you current in the world of CE/CME events. We’ll cover Joint Accreditation, the updates and unification of the CME for MOC program, take a quick look at the ACCME 2020 Online Meeting, and point you to ongoing resources available whether or not you were able to attend. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook for weekly compliance tips and other timely updates!
Joint Accreditation: 10 Years of IPCE
Have you considered whether Joint Accreditation may be right for your organization? Does your organization provide activities for learners from multiple disciplines? To date, over 100 providers have made the decision to become accredited through Joint Accreditation for Interprofessional Continuing Education. Together, these more than 100 providers design and deliver more than 30,000 educational activities each year.
This year marks the 10th anniversary of Joint Accreditation; 10 years ago, in 2010, the first two organization were granted Joint Accreditation. Since that time, a wide range of organizations have made the move to Joint Accreditation, including schools of health sciences/medicine, hospitals and healthcare delivery systems, government and military organizations, nonprofit membership organizations, publishing and education companies, and more.
What is Joint Accreditation? It’s built on the concept that healthcare is delivered, and learned, in teams – and that optimally, these teams need to learn together to perform at their peak. Joint Accreditation offers organizations the opportunity to be simultaneously accredited so that they can facilitate team education. Through a unified accreditation process and unified set of accreditation standards, Joint Accreditation is a way for organizations to provide CE and IPCE credit for multiple health professions.
The emphasis on IPCE (Interprofessional Continuing Education) has been a central theme in CE, and is outlined in the recent article, The Role and Rise of Interprofessional Continuing Education. This article is a great starting point for organization beginning to consider the benefits of Joint Accreditation. The authors point to the strong correlation between engagement in IPCE and improvements in health care professionals’ knowledge, attitudes, competence and performance, as well as patient and system outcomes.
As Joint Accreditation expands, more continuing accreditors have come onboard. The current eight accreditors represent the professions of medicine, nursing, optometry, PAs (physician assistants), pharmacy, psychology, social work, and most recently, dentistry.
Dentistry is the most recent addition to the list of professions available in Joint Accreditation. Late last year, the American Dental Association’s Continuing Education Recognition Program (ADA CERP) announced its collaboration with Joint Accreditation for Interprofessional Continuing EducationTM. With this expansion, jointly accredited organizations now have the option to include dentists in their programs without needing to attain a separate accreditation with ADA CERP.
The most recent Joint Accreditation for Interprofessional Continuing Education Leadership Summit (2019) brought together more than 100 IPCE professionals that represented 60 organizations. A summary report, Let’s Go, Team! Planning Education for Maximum Impact!, captures the highlights from the summit and focuses on maximizing the impact of IPCE, how best to plan team-based activities, and what to expect when a CE team expands to include other disciplines.
Whether you are already Jointly Accredited or just wondering if it might be the next right step for you, AOE Consulting is available to help you navigate your organization’s next steps.
Reach out to us at inquire@aoeconsulting.com.
Unified CME for MOC Guide & Resources
The ACCME recently released a new, unified CME for MOC Program Guide for accredited CE providers who offer activities for MOC credit. In addition to the program guide, a new webpage and additional resources have also been released with the explanation that the ACCME is aiming to provide “streamlined, user-friendly information to help [providers] plan and deliver CME activities that count for MOC”.
Providers should note, however, that while the resources, webpage, and guide are new, the actual requirement for the collaborative boards have NOT changed. Future changes will be noted in updates to the program guide and via email notification.
Here is what to expect for each of the new resources:
- CME for MOC Program Guide: A unified guide that takes the place of each individual, board-specific guide. Terminology overview tables are now available, as are common requirement sections.
- CME that Counts for MOC Webpage: A unified webpage that takes the place of each individual, board-specific CME for MOC webpages.
- CME for MOC Activity Planning Worksheet: A worksheet designed to assist providers in understanding and charting progress towards MOC requirements.
- CME for MOC Beginner’s Guide: To be used alongside the CME for MOC Program Guide, this is an overview designed for providers new to the MOC process.
- CME for MOC Evaluation Guide: Provides examples and descriptions of feedback techniques and evaluation tools for providers.
Specific questions regarding these updates can be direction to info@accme.org.
ACCME 2020 Online Meeting Recap
Adapting to the global pandemic, the ACCME hosted a virtual online meeting to allow a virtual space for educators and CE professionals to connect and grow. Held on May 7-8 of this year, the ACCME 2020 Online Meeting welcomed over 2,100 participants that represented more than 1,100 organizations from 22 countries.
The meeting webpage now features additional, ongoing resources for the CE community including research posters and testimonies included in the #MyCMEStory project. These resources, and additional material to be posted soon, are available free of charge and do not require registration. Additionally, a brief recap video can be found online here.
While not the entire focus, the COVID-19 global pandemic was a central topic of conversation at the Online Meeting. Practical and strategic approaches to managing education during (and after) the pandemic were discussed, along with many relevant topics. The online format was able to support multiple functions, including plenary webinars, concurrent sessions, research chat sessions, and colleague chat sessions.
Over the summer, the ACCME will be debuting ACCME Academy, a new online learning portal. The Academy is slated to provide online training for CE professionals and will launch with a Newcomers’ Introduction to Accredited Continuing Education and an ACCME Accreditation Workshop: Virtual Edition on August 6-7.
Stay tuned: Registration for these two activities will begin later this month!
Upcoming Activities/Education Opportunities
- AAMSE Annual Conference
July 15-17, 2020, Austin, TX
Read More >> - ACCME August 2020 Accreditation Workshop: Virtual Edition
August 6-7, 2020, Chicago, IL
Read More >> - ACPE CPE 2020 Conference: Commitment to Excellence
September 29-30, 2020, Chicago, IL
Registration Information TBD - ANCC National Magnet Conference and Pathway to Excellence Conference
October 7-9, 2020, Atlanta, GA
Read More >>