Supporting Physician Lifelong Learning Through Effective Continuing Medical Education and Professional Development

Abstract

The medical profession has seen significant advancement in the availability of a variety of educational activities, across a range of formats and processes, to help physicians remain current and improve professional performance. The objectivity and quality of continuing medical education (CME) activities has been enhanced by the credit recognition systems of the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP), the American Medical Association (AMA), and the American Osteopathic Association (AOA). These credit systems also provide a metric for tracking compliance with a variety of regulatory requirements such as state medical licensure, hospital staff privileges, and health insurance plan participation, and are increasingly used as criteria for voluntarily obtaining and maintaining specialty certification and fulfilling requirements for membership in medical specialty societies. This article reviews the history of CME, the research that supports its value, and the opportunities that exist to address its challenges. It also explains how the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB) Maintenance of Licensure (MOL) framework incorporates and builds upon the research involving the effectiveness of CME for physician learning and improvement. Special focus is given to the CME credit systems and their features, the synergies among them, and the way in which various learning formats that can be certified for CME credit are aligned with the three recommended components of MOL.