Ask Us Anything: March Edition

As we roll into Spring and warmer weather, there are still people who are desperately asking for our advice (I know, we’re surprised as well). Must mean we’re doing something right.

Remember, if you have an issue (professional or personal) you want us to help with, you can click here to submit your question(s). We promise not to make fun of your issues and may actually offer useful advice.

Dear Derek and Scott,

Does Accreditation with Commendation provide more value to grant applications compared to regular Accreditation?

Succinctly,

Commendation Contemplator

SCOTT: The ACCME introduced the Accreditation with Commendation criteria in 2016 as a way for providers to “incentivise organisations to advance their educational strategy and recognise organisations that excel as continuing medical education (CME) providers” (this quote is taken from a 2022 article authored by ACCME President and CEO Graham McMahon – you can tell that Graham is from “across the pond” since he used British spelling of some terms in here).

I can’t tell you precisely how many organizations currently have the Accreditation with Commendation designation – it was apparently 49 between 2017-2022 according to said article, but a recent cursory examination of the ACCME website seems to indicate that it’s at least double that now. There are somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,600 total providers, so my guestimate is that about 6-7% have achieved the Accreditation with Commendation designation. I thought that the ACCME used to provide a free Excel spreadsheet with basic information about all accredited providers (am I wrong about this?) that I could have carved up to tell you the precise current numbers, but it costs $200 for a one-time download now, and that’s beyond our current CMEpalooza research budget.

From my perspective, I always assumed that the primary value of being an organization who achieved Accreditation with Commendation was that you had to be re-accredited every 6 years (vs. every 4 years for accredited organizations without this designation). For anyone who has been through the ACCME re-accreditation process, this is a fairly big deal as preparing paperwork for this takes lots of time. I never really considered the issue from the perspective of the supporter, so I’ll let Derek address the essence of what you are asking about.

DEREK: Oh boy. OK, first things first…my opinions are my opinions and do not represent the opinions of my employer, colleagues, anyone else who reviews grants, blah, blah, etc., etc.

Now that we have that out of the way, my short answer to your question is — and this is just my own opinion — maybe a little, but not really.

My slightly longer answer is that an organization’s accreditation status is not something I put much thought into when I am reviewing a grant application, other than noting whether or not the org is accredited. If they had probationary status, then yes, that could potentially detract from the value of the application. But as far as “regular” Accreditation vs Accreditation with Commendation goes, that is not a distinction I generally factor in as part of my grant decision-making process.

There is certainly value in achieving Accreditation with Commendation, as Scott notes above, and this is certainly not meant to take away from that. But if an organization’s primary motivation for obtaining a higher-level accreditation status is based on a theory that it will help win more grants, I’d suggest that’s an ill-conceived theory.

Dear Derek and Scott,

If you are a CME company that is new to pharma grant space, what are the best things you can do to win your first pharma grant besides the application? Does networking help? Marketing? Partnering with another company? Fill in the blank? What are the worst things you can do? I’ll take your best 101 and any jokes you can pepper in.

Sweetly,

Bird New to This Place and Trying to Land

DEREK: Two muffins are sitting in an oven. The first muffin says “wow, it is hot in here!” The second muffin says “wow, a talking muffin!” (You said you would take any jokes, not our best jokes.)

The advice that I would give any company applying for grants, whether new or not, is to keep in mind that the majority of the time you are competing against other companies for a limited pool of funds. You need to present the best justification for why they should pick you for the grant (this is an oversimplification, but you get my point.)

If you are a new company, then you are starting at a lower baseline than the other companies you are competing with. You have no history with the grantor, they are not familiar with your services/products/applications/etc., and they don’t know if you are capable of doing what you say you are going to do. You need to convince the grantor you are the best company for the job, but they have no idea who you are. Not an easy task. Here are a few things you can do.

Networking: Networking helps, yes. Anything that gets people more familiar with your company is helpful. Some people are more willing to meet than others, and some have preferred methods for meeting (in-person vs virtual), so try to be as flexible as possible. Attending industry meetings such as the Alliance conference and AIS can be beneficial as many grantors reserve time there for 1:1 meetings.

Partnering: In this situation, partnering with another organization with defined expertise and a proven track record is an excellent idea. At the very least, having a known organization as part of the proposed program may ease some of the grantor’s concerns about working with an unknown organization. The partner org may also have more grant management experience than you do and may be able to prove some helpful tips.

Hire a Medical Editor: I don’t have the time or space to go through all the ins and outs of proposal development here, but one of the absolute best things you can do to help your chances of winning a grant is to put together a good, well written, concise proposal. One of the worst things you can do is to put together a poorly written, meandering, uninformative proposal. A good medical editor will help avoid that from happening. They’re worth the investment.

SCOTT: What did the belligerent birthday cake say to the party guests?

“You want a piece of me?!?!”

If Saturday Night Live is looking for new writers, you know where to find us…

Anyway, as to your question — back when I worked exclusively as a freelance medical writer, I was fortunate enough to receive a few grant awards each year for projects that I primarily designed and developed. But because I was a one-man show and, at least initially, an unknown quantity to a lot of supporters, I always partnered with associations and/or academic centers where they were the “named” lead  grantor and I served more in a secondary role within the proposal itself (even if I led the actual funded projects themselves from an execution perspective). I would highly recommend that newcomers go this route if possible. As Derek notes, the grant world is a highly competitive space, and funders are understandably hesitant about giving substantial funding to people and organizations they have never heard of, no matter how innovative their proposal may be.

Dear Derek and Scott,

When planning an RSS case conference, do you need disclosures from everyone in the room attending, or just the planning committee who serves as a moderator to ensure that the discussion is CME compliant? I am seeing different accredited providers doing it both ways. My issue is that our case conferences have large attendees/audiences, and getting disclosures from everyone isn’t always very feasible.

With Frustration,

Over Disclosed and Under Paid

SCOTT: As with most issues related to accreditation, I had no idea how to answer this question, so I turned to a few colleagues who are accreditation experts (who in turn passed this question along to other accreditation experts to make sure they were giving me the right information. Not surprisingly, this is a group that does things by the book).

Here is the gist of their advice – no matter how big or small your RSS case series, you do need disclosures from planners, managers, presenters, and moderators who are involved in the series, but not from everyone in the audience. This is pretty much covered in ACCME Standard 3.1.

I understand that most accredited providers prefer to err on the side of caution and will typically collect more paperwork than is needed to CYA. But in this case, where perhaps you have tens, or even hundreds, of learners participating in your RSS, collecting a disclosure from everyone in the room is both onerous and unnecessary.

DEREK: