Continuing Medical Education Asthma Program Honored by CACME

The National Jewish Health Office of Professional Education has received an award from the Colorado Alliance for Continuing Medical Education (CACME) for its innovative program Improving the Quality of Care for Patients with Asthma. The program teaches primary care physicians and other health professionals how to better care for their asthma patients by working through virtual patient cases on provided iPads and comparing responses with other participants. Participants in the program are also able to ask questions of the faculty and see how other participants are responding through an automated polling system.

CACME designated the free program, which was funded by educational grants from Merck, AstraZeneca, Sunovion, and Boehringer Ingelheim, an Outstanding Continuing Medical Education (CME) Activity in recognition of its innovative use of technology and creative delivery, significance to the profession, and impact of the educational outcomes to the CME profession.

“The Outstanding CME Activity award is an acknowledgement of the hard work and dedication of National Jewish Health faculty and the entire professional education staff to organize quality, innovate programs for the medical community,” said Andrea Harshman, MHA, CCMEP, CMP, director, Office of Professional Education at National Jewish Health.

National Jewish Health faculty Michael Wechsler, MD, Rohit Katial, MD, and David Beuther, MD, created the program content to address a variety of asthma assessment and management issues. The format utilizes SeamlessCME, a platform offered by RealCME, with whom National Jewish Health partnered in this program. The platform allows faculty to assess learners’ ability to interpret data and select treatments in evolving, virtual clinical scenarios.

The outcomes of the program showed an overall 45 percent increase in subject mastery for asthma. In addition, 79 percent of learners indicated they would be making changes in their practice as a result of the education provided in the activity, with the majority stating they would make modifications to asthma treatment plans.

National Jewish Health is the leading respiratory hospital in the nation. Founded 114 years ago as a nonprofit hospital, National Jewish Health today is the only facility in the world dedicated exclusively to groundbreaking medical research and treatment of patients with respiratory, cardiac, immune and related disorders. Patients and families come to National Jewish Health from around the world to receive cutting-edge, comprehensive, coordinated care.  To learn more, visit www.njhealth.org.

National Jewish Health is accredited by the Accreditation Council of Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians.