19th Annual GAME Meeting

Looking to the Future of Global CPD:
Linking New Ideas and Approaches to Reaching and Engaging Health Professionals

18 - 20 May 2014

Coral Gables, Florida, USA

Representatives from the Americas, Europe, Asia and Australia attended the 19th annual meeting of the Global Alliance for Medical Education (GAME) in Coral Gables, Florida, USA between May 18th- and May 20th and participated in a series of networking and educational sessions that focused on the impact of technology, research and new educational approaches in continuing medical education and continuing professional development (CME/CPD).
Invited presentations covered the following topics

• the theoretical basis of medical education research
  
• web-based patient engagement tools
  
• international professional communities
  
• the use of an integrated health information system to support educational strategies
  
• the integration of Evidence-Based Medicine and Best Evidence Medical Education to confront the challenge of improving outcomes
  

and were supplemented by panel discussions, a competitive game on global CME/CPD knowledge, and abstract presentations on a range of projects carried out in some of the countries represented at the meeting.

Dr Melchor Sanchez Mendiola of the Faculty of Medicine of the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City provided a comprehensive, yet engaging, opening presentation that prompted participants to question their assumptions and reflect on various paradigms, ontologies, epistemologies, methodologies and conceptual frameworks related to medical education research. He gave a strong endorsement to the use of a mixed method approach in medical education research and highlighted the fact that the field itself is now an area of study in various higher degree courses.

To illustrate the importance of a research-driven educational intervention, Dr Frances Thorndike of the University of Virginia presented an overview of an internet-based tool that addresses the medical issues associated with insomnia. The technology platform (BeStudy Manager) on which the intervention tool is based has lent itself to use in a variety of other conditions ranging from diabetes to paediatric encopresis. The specific application for insomnia is undergoing clinical trials in Australia, Denmark and Norway with plans for further testing in Germany. The technology platform is designed to allow flexible content management for either clinician education or patient intervention and, in Dr Thorndike’s opinion, highlights the potential of technology-delivered patient assessment and intervention tools in CME/CPD.

Dr Alvaro Margolis of Universidad de la República, Uruguay continued the invited presentations with a description and discussion of network structure and behaviour among professional communities in relation to his experience in Latin America. His central theme was that, because “knowledge is just a click away” the main reason professionals participate in conferences is to network and validate their current knowledge with peers and experts. His thesis continued with the notion that networks are one of the most valuable assets of a professional community and that technology now allows for radical innovations such as high impact courses, communities of practice and hybrid congresses in CME as well as in clinical practice. Dr Margolis concluded that International audiences may benefit from online CME to créate new communication links across borders taking into consideration elements such as languages, culture and systems of care.

Continuing the representation from Latin America, Dr Fernan Gonzalez Bernaldo de Quiros of the Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires described how an Integrated Health Information System (HIS) can support educational strategies for patients and health professionals. He outlined Initial evaluation of a component of a CME System integrated to an EHR in an academic Hospital in Argentina. Learning opportunities were linked to information system data reports but only 15% of the physician users accessed links offered. A personal database of information accessed is present on the HER, and a patient portal can also be used to provide information to physician users. Dr Quiros postulated that an integrated health information system can create a "learning health system" by expanding the focus from individual learning to learning form the system as a whole with the provision of indexed and contextualized information.

Dr Melchor Sanchez Mendiola returned to complete the roster of invited presentations by drawing many of the threads of the conference together in a presentation on Integrating Evidence into CPD towards improving outcomes. The plethora of evidence-based sources and resources for CME/CPD was reviewed as well as relevant applications of implementation and dissemination science. A comparison of Kirkpatrick and Moore’s outcome evaluation models was enhanced by the fact that Dr Donald Moore was one of the participants in the conference and was able to provide immediate input to the discussion. Dr Sanchez also emphasised the imperative of patient care and best evidence as the foundations for successful CME/CPD that leads to performance improvement in clinical practice and meaningful patient outcomes.

Panel discussions moderated by Dr Don Moore provided useful discussion and prompted many relevant questions from the audience, which allowed clarification of some of the theoretical ideas promulgated in the invited presentations.

Presentations chosen from submitted abstracts also highlighted the range of CME/CPD being conducted in the global community, with presentations on the the following topics:

Russian for Healthcare Providers: A Novel Course in both Inter-professional Education and Cultural Competency
Daniel B. Topping, MD University of Central Florida College of Medicine

Continuing Medical Education Credit Points - Disparity in India: A Case Study
Vaibhav Srivastava MPharm PGDBA Insignia Communications

Improving Patient Care by Integrating a Quality Improvement Initiative into an EHR System
Dale Kummerle PharmD Bristol-Myers Squibb

Improved Outcomes in CME Activities by Incorporating Patient Perspective
Tom Bregartner MBA Quintiles Medical Education

Impact of Electronic Instructional Methods on Knowledge and Competence
Kathleen Geissel PharmD CCMEP Medscape/WebMD

International Chapters – leveraging Local Organizations for Educational Dissemination
Connie Liu American College of Cardiology

Anti-bribery Procedures and Anti-corruption Laws: Where is FMV when you need it?
Maureen Lloyd BSc PwC LLP

For more information about the Global Alliance for Medical Education (GAME), please visit https://game-cme.org.  

Members, view the full conference report as well as speaker slides, conference program, and recorded post-conference webinar in Resources.