Patients Helping Doctors with CME: A Web-Based Solution?

For many physicians, continuing medical education (CME) is a way to stay up-to-date to all the latest improvement in our field so that that in return, we can help their patients more efficiently. Doctors do this by attending seminars, lectures, conferences, or even as simple as reading recently published research. What not many doctors know is that patients can actually help us with our CME.

Sometimes, a lack of motivation or the supreme belief in oneself stops a doctor from pursuing actively CME. That is why, as a Continuing Medical Education Content Consultant, I think it is best that patients take an active part in pushing doctors or health care professionals, in general, to learn new things and explore new technologies. It is true that most physicians do not want to be placed in a situation where an unanswered question from a patient can ruin an otherwise reputation. However, these tough questions from patients can be just the impetus a physician needs to get a little "continuing education," whether formal CME credits are offered, or not.

Medical professionals encounter this exact situation the clinics. There's a tough question. Then the MD flips through a familiar reference or even asks professor Google.

Where am I really heading with this? Well, in my mind I am picturing an environment where individual patients can ask questions casually to several doctors; and the doctors and patients need not be in the same place at the same time. What good is the Internet if we cannot use it to our advantage, right?

So my proposition is this – why can't doctors and all other health care professionals participate in CME by maintaining a website wherein patients can ask doctors questions and the doctors will answer free of charge? At the same time, the physicians would earn CME credit for their service. Think of it this way: when you are given a challenging question (something your years of experience have not taught you), you will dive into extensive research and you won’t stop until that question is answered. Aside from the fact that you learn something new, you will learn or re-learn a lot of other things in the process of finding the answer.

I know this is an unconventional approach to CME, but it seems a reasonable avenue to explore. Why not earn CME credits for answering online questions? The problem is that the system would have to appropriately accredited - this is exceedingly difficult but not impossible. Coming across a question any of us have never heard before, forces all of us go out and "educate" ourselves. Why not formalize it in a web-based system and ear some continuing medical education credits along the way?

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