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Joint NAMSS/ACCME Webinar Still Resonates With Attendees and Its Presenters

By Teddy Durgin

On July 23, a joint NAMSS/ACCME webinar was held titled "What's Next in CME? Essential Insights for NAMSS Members.” The comprehensive session explored the evolving alignment between continuing medical education (CME) and credentialing, privileging, certification, and licensure. Among the topics discussed were the latest strategies for remediation and how to utilize the increasingly available CME data in the CME Passport program. Learning objectives included how CME is changing to respond to the evolving learning needs of healthcare professionals and how to leverage existing data flows to simplify CME credit capture and compliance.

The primary speaker and presenter was Dr. Graham McMahon, president and CEO of the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) and an adjunct professor of medicine and medical education at Northwestern University. McMahon feels there were two main takeaways from the webinar: “Number one, [medical services professionals, or MSPs] can leverage CME for quality, teaming, retention, remediation. And, number two, we encourage you to partner with your CME staff to facilitate easy CME data management for [Maintenance of Certification, or MOC], licensure, certification, and privileging.”

Helping to facilitate the Q&As and discussion from the audience was healthcare consultant Susan DuBois, CPCS, CPMSM. Looking back on the online session, she feels McMahon “provided a great overview of what the ACCME does and how it relates to medical services professionals. He included suggestions for how MSPs could engage the CME team, working together to solve issues through education and collaboration.”

She continues, “He also spent time educating the audience about the ACCME's Passport program, which provides a single place for providers to record their participation in accredited education program as well as provides a listing of all accredited educational activities available to providers. The ACCME is a great resource for MSPs for all issues associated with accredited education.”

Also singing McMahon's praises was NAMSS President Lisa Goodwin, MBA, CPCS, CPMSM. She states, “I appreciate Dr. McMahon’s willingness to work with NAMSS. The ACCME’s partnership reinforces our commitment to build and maintain strong relationships with industry partners that support our membership."

McMahon directs both the ACCME system for accrediting national and international CME providers and the ACCME system for recognizing state and territory medical societies as accreditors for intrastate CME providers. He joined the ACCME in April 2015 from Harvard Medical School, where he served as associate dean for continuing education and associate professor of medicine.

For her part, DuBois retired in February 2021 after a 33-year career working at Intermountain Healthcare, an integrated healthcare delivery system headquartered in Salt Lake City. She has served in a number of leadership roles with NAMSS, including on the Executive Committee of the NAMSS Board and as the 2017 President.

Looking ahead, one of the questions posed during the webinar was “Would the ACCME consider creating a session on how a CME coordinator oversees the CME process?” How was this question addressed? McMahon replied, “We offer a number of online education through our ACCME Academy, as well as offer an annual in-person Accreditation Workshop — this year Aug. 26-28 — that are designed to help CME coordinators oversee the CME process. We would be delighted to consider such a custom session for NAMSS.”

Also discussed was Colorado recently enacting a CME requirement for medical license renewal. DuBois says, “Dr. McMahon noted that he had recently spoken to the Colorado licensing board about this topic and would be happy to continue to dialogue.”

Nearly a month removed from the July webinar, DuBois and McMahon have fond memories of the experience. It’s “sitting well” with both. DuBois remarks, “The best part of the webinar was the engagement of the MSP and this important topic. Dr. McMahon was able to provide real examples of how MSPs can engage with the CME processes to solve a variety of issues associated with educational needs of providers.”

McMahon concludes, “I was personally delighted by the enthusiasm of the MSPs. They clearly see the value of our data collaborative, as it can be a powerful tool for them to ensure that physicians are getting access to the CME they want and need. We all benefit from well-educated physicians who are relieved of administrative burdens so they can focus on delivering the highest quality patient care. I can’t wait to see everyone in Denver in September [McMahon will be speaking at NAMSS’s 48th Educational Conference & Exhibition in Colorado, which will be held Sept. 29 to Oct. 2, 2024] and talk some more!”