Effect of COVID-19 on Continuing Education Activities and Learner Interactions: Report From Six Accreditation Systems

Journal of CME (06/28/24) Regnier, Kate; Smith, Amy; Natali, Jean-Philippe; et al.

Researchers evaluated six continuing education (CE) accreditation systems to see how the COVID-19 pandemic affected CE activities and learners. The six CE accreditation systems included are the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education; the American Academy of Family Physicians; the French National Agency for continuing professional development; the European Board for Accreditation of Continuing Education for Health Professionals; the Accreditation Section of the Department of Healthcare Professions – Ministry of Public Health, Qatar; and the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. Surveys with each of the systems show that the lockdowns in the earlier phase of the pandemic resulted in fewer onsite in-person meetings. But CE providers were quick to transition to virtual educational formats. This was facilitated by several factors, including that the technology for the online meetings was already available, the need to rapidly align with evolving knowledge and inform about changing regulatory frameworks, the need to maintain activities that focused on facilitating scientific exchange and making progress in non-pandemic related areas, and needing to maintain the support of membership and commercial supporters, among others. "In conclusion," the authors write, "our data convincingly demonstrate the resilience of [ continuing professional development (CPD)] in times of a global health crisis and offer important insights in how CPD might become more effective in the future."

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