The Alliance for Continuing Medical Education has launched what many at the organization’s 36th Annual Conference in San Francisco last month described as an ambitious new vision, mission, and strategic plan designed to broaden the organization’s scope beyond certified CME to include the full spectrum of professional healthcare education and continuing professional development.

“The board determined that today’s healthcare environment requires that we move beyond our traditional role of assisting individuals and organizations that offer continuing education designed primarily for physician audiences,” said George Mejicano, MD, president of the Alliance and assistant dean/director, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine. The move is intended to facilitate the transformation of CME into a system that encompasses continuing medical education, informatics, and performance quality improvement.

At the conference’s opening on January 26, immediate past president Jann Balmer, PhD, FACME, director, CME University of Virginia School of Medicine, told the audience that one of the organization’s first priorities would be to consider changing the organization’s name to better reflect the full range of the organization’s membership.

In fact, she said, the primary strategic commitment of the Alliance now will be to expand the organization’s focus beyond certified CME to make it truly interprofessional. The remaining seven commitments that make up the new strategic plan—all of which “fall under the promise of the first,” said Balmer—are to:
-Broaden the focus of the Alliance to include healthcare-related continuing education and continuing professional development;

-Be visionary and proactive in strategically aligning the Alliance with the emerging healthcare environment while remaining sensitive to current needs;

-Model innovative leadership to shape the future;

-Actively develop strategic relationships with other healthcare organizations;

-Build a strategy to be the recognized voice for continuing professional development in the health professions;

-Be the professional home for health professionals;

-Advance the field of CPD through research and other scholarly activities.

Visit the Alliance for CME’s Web site for more on the vision, mission, and strategic plan, and look for more in the March/April issue of Medical Meetings.

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