While Derek was working on another of his infamous Top 10 lists (coming soon: Top 10 Wordle starters, Top 10 1930s radio shows, Top 10 foods that start with the letter Q), the rest of us at CMEpalooza HQ have been diligently planning actual education for our community. I know, what a concept.

We should have at least an initial draft of our CMEpalooza Spring agenda ready in the next few days — and thank you to everyone who submitted an abstract for consideration — but in the meantime, we have a special announcement.

At 11 a.m. ET on Wednesday, February 23, we will be hosting our first of (hopefully) several CMEpalooza Spotlights in 2022. This one is being sponsored by the fine folks at PlatformQ Health and will focus on the topic of “Equity in Clinical Trials Is Within Reach: Patient Voices in Medical Education Matter.”

Separately, both diversity and the patient voice are hot topics in CME, so it kinda only makes sense to mush them together into an educational session (anyone else have the “Who put their chocolate in my peanut butter commercial?” playing in their head right now? No? Hmm, moving on…).

In this 30-minute session, we’ll mix together peanut butter and chocolate… er, I mean, diversity and the patient voice… and explore how providers can not just include patients in their education, but the right patients from the right backgrounds. We’ll not only get the perspective of the provider, but also a representative from a patient advocacy group, a patient who has participated in CME programming, and other folks.

As with all CMEpalooza sessions, this is free for anyone to attend. You’ll just need to go to our LIVE page at 11 a.m. ET on Wednesday, February 23 to watch. We’ll see you there.

 

Today is Derek’s birthday (it’s impolite to ask how old he is), and he told me that there are only two things he wants:

1. This game-worn Kenny Thomas Philadelphia 76ers jersey from the landmark 2002-03 season
2. Your submission of a CMEpalooza abstract for our Spring event

Yes indeed, there are only two more days for you to brainstorm a super creative idea for consideration as a CMEpalooza Spring session. You can get all the information you need here about what we’re looking for and how to go about submitting your idea. Perhaps if your session is extra, extra special, you’ll even be in the running for a Paloozie when we have our next awards ceremony in 2029 (mark your calendars now).

Derek already suffered a crushing birthday disappointment this morning when he found out his childhood crush (Vickie from Small Wonder) wasn’t an actual girl. Don’t make things worse for him.

As the plane touched down in Philadelphia on Saturday evening, I did one last self-check (Am I feeling OK? Anything out of the ordinary? How worried should I be about the guy sitting across from me who was sniffling the entire flight?) and breathed a sigh of relief. I made it.

Honestly, I think that’s about the best thing that many of us who were onsite at the Alliance conference can say. We made it.

Yes, there was good education and networking and all of the stuff that usually happens at the Alliance, but for the vast majority of us who congregated in Denver (well, technically Aurora), this was the first large-ish gathering of people we had been a part of in nearly two years. Much like the NFL preseason, the primary goal was simply to get through the event unscathed. Or more specifically, COVID free.

I had some interesting ethical discussions with a few people about what they would do, thousands of miles from home, if they tested positive for COVID while at the Alliance. Quarantine for 5 days? Until you are feeling better? Not at all? We all know what the CDC says, but things aren’t always so black and white in real life. I am sure there were least a small number of people at the Alliance who were faced with this difficult dilemma (the few people I know who tested positive during the conference were local). I don’t envy the decision they had to make.

Sitting back in my office this morning, I’m not sure whether those of us who decided to push forward with our attendance despite the octopus-like reach of Omicron were brave or stupid. I am glad I went, and I got a lot of positive energy from being able to finally re-engage with the CME community, but it was definitely a strange environment. Some people were more skittish in a crowd of colleagues than others, and I can’t blame them. As with everything these days, it’s a matter of risk tolerance.

So kudos to the attendees for bravely masking up and immersing in a live educational event. And kudos too to those of you who stayed home, deciding the risk wasn’t worth it. Who was right and who was wrong? There are arguments for both sides – you know them as well as I do.

However, there was definitely one perk of Alliance’s decision to push forward with the in-person conference — the debut of the CMEpalooza Roving Reporter! We have one more episode of questions and answers to share today before shutting things down for the time being. I’ll pass the fedora to Derek the next time around.

Here were our questions:

1. What has the COVID pandemic forced your organization to get better at?
2. Who is your favorite Sesame Street character?

Caitlyn Keenan
Accreditation Manager
Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine

What has the COVID pandemic forced your organization to get better at?

Digitizing – getting away from paper everything. We do a lot of joint providership, and we used to have all paper certifications, paper disclosure forms, paper certification forms, and just lots of paper everywhere. Now, we’re all digital. Our staff and our members can do everything online now.

Who is your favorite Sesame Street character?

Cookie Monster

 

Rebecca Stachurski
Senior Health Education Coordinator
University of Kentucky

What has the COVID pandemic forced your organization to get better at?

I was brought on in the middle of the pandemic so this is a tough one. But one of the things my organization does really well is communicate with each other. We have managed to maintain a really great rapport, which isn’t necessarily CME related, but it’s something that stands out to me.

Who is your favorite Sesame Street character?

Cookie Monster (note from Scott: I sense a pattern)

Valerie Bakies Lile, CAE, FACOOG
Executive Director
American College of Osteopathic Obstetricians & Gynecologists

What has the COVID pandemic forced your organization to get better at?

There is a rumor that it’s making smoked bourbon, but it’s really digital education. That was a priority of our organizational strategic plan that we drafted in January 2020. At the time, we thought it would be a 3-year action item. And then March 2020 happened and we fast tracked it so it became a 17-day action item in time for our annual conference. Since then, we’ve tried multiple formats and multiple platforms, and I think we all feel that we have accomplished what we set out to do.

Who is your favorite Sesame Street character?

I want to say Oscar the Grouch, but I also like the Swedish Chef (Note from Scott: Yes, I know the Swedish Chef is not Sesame Street, but these are all technically Muppets so let’s not judge too harshly)