“This could either be one of the best things or one of the dumbest things we’ve ever done.” — Derek Warnick, December 2024

Back in the late 1800s, it was very popular for famous authors to publish their latest novels as newspaper serials, releasing a new chapter every week in whatever broadsheet paid them the most money. Classics such as The Count of Monte Cristo, A Tale of Two Cities, and Around the World in Eighty Days were all originally published in this manner before being released as full novels. It was a way for authors to make extra money as well as build interest in their literature. I am guessing it was somewhat akin to the way that we used to have to wait until every Wednesday at 10 pm to find out the latest twist in the Dynasty feud between the Carringtons and the Colbys.

Of course, seeing as Derek and I are on the cutting edge of technology, we figured we’ll roll back the clock (wayyy back) and revisit the glory of the serial story era this winter with our special form of improv literature. Starting today and continuing over the next 6 Fridays, we’ll publish one part of The CMEslinger. We’ve alternated the writing of each part, basically forcing each other to continue the story where the last person has left off. We didn’t discuss our plans for the story as it progressed (hence the “improv” component). I think we’ve done fairly well not trapping each other into a corner with each part, but you can be the judge of that.

So without further ado, part one of The CMEslinger.

Part 1 (Derek)
The man in black fled across the desert, and the CMEslinger followed.

The omnipresent sun, nearing its unmerciful daily zenith, had scorched the sky free from all but the barest traces of blue. Slouching down slightly in his saddle to better settle into the rhythms of the palomino pony he rode, the CMEslinger reached for the canteen strapped across his body and lifted it to his dried, cracked lips.

Of all the disappointments the CMEslinger had experienced in a life full of many, none brought his faded grey eyes closer to tears than the hollow sound of the desert wind howling across his empty canteen. Flinging it away in disgust, he spurred the pony on, muttering to himself, “I really should have filled up the dang canteen at the office before I left. And why did I decide to ride a horse instead of calling an Uber?”

Crusty old Phinneas – part mentor, part tormentor, part department head – would be disappointed in him. “Never be not prepared!” he constantly drilled into his team, his indirect phrasing baffling them all into a fresh awareness of old ideas. Old Phinneas would be disappointed in him, but not surprised, the CMEslinger never being a favorite. That honor was reserved for the darkly dressed man he now pursued.

With a head shake of annoyance, the CMEslinger glanced at the dented pewter pocket watch with the Philadelphia 76ers logo in the middle that he always kept tied to his saddle horn. He’d been chasing the man in black for several hours now and had made no progress. Peering through narrowed eyes battling the sun’s unrelenting rays, the only remaining sign of the man in black was the powdery dust kicked up by his rental car settling on the desert highway.

The conference was in two days and the man in black was slipping from his grasp. He had to get moving.

I admit that sometimes when I write about the planning conversations that Scott and I have, I take a bit of artistic license with the actual text of those conversations. Shocking, I know. However, I promise you that the re-creation below of our recent lunchtime CMEpalooza Spring planning meeting is almost 100% accurate.

Derek & Scott: [spend 55 minutes talking about the Eagles, Sixers, work, our offspring, how expensive college is, etc.]
Scott, as the server brings us our bill: Well, I guess we should talk about CMEpalooza Spring [opens up notebook]
Derek: [completely empty-handed and looking baffled] You have notes? Why? Aren’t we just going to ask people to submit abstracts like we usually do?
Scott: Yes, but I have a few other ideas I thought we could disc-
Derek: [standing up so fast he bangs his knee on the table] OK, I think we’re done here…

Yes, it’s that time of year, and the planning has begun for CMEpalooza Spring (it’s on Wednesday, April 16. Save the date in your calendar if you haven’t already.) As in the past few years, we want to include a broad range of the CE community in the planning and development process of the CMEpalooza Spring agenda. Anyone is welcome to submit an idea for a CMEpalooza Spring session, though it would probably help if it’s a good idea (we tend to like those).

The process is fairly simple. If you have an idea for a session that you would like to lead at CMEpalooza Spring, just complete the CMEpalooza Spring 2025 Abstract Submission form by the end of the day on Wednesday, February 12. After that, Scott and I will review all the proposals we receive and select at least five for the official Spring agenda. If there are more that we like, we may hold onto some ideas for the Fall event, as well.

Here are a few guidelines:

1. This is a virtual conference and all sessions are done via StreamYard. It’s easy.
2. Proposals will only be considered if they are submitted either via the abstract submission form or by carrier pigeon. Choose whichever method is easier for you, but remember that I have two cats and one of them is nuts. CMEpalooza cannot guarantee the safe return of your pigeon.
3. The deadline for proposals to be submitted is 9 p.m. ET on Wednesday, February 12.
4. We are open to pretty much any idea as long as it relates in some way to CME/CE. The more creative, the better. My dream is for someone to propose a musical (this is not Scott’s dream). (note from Scott: Derek just returned from the Wicked Sing-Along so his dream is more desperate than ever. He recommends leading with “No One Mourns the Rejected Grant Proposal” and going from there)
5. Interactive formats with multiple presenters, such as panel sessions and interviews, are encouraged. If you want to figure out a unique way to incorporate our audience response platform (Poll Everywhere) into your session, that’s totally fine too.
6. Please verify the availability of all presenters for the date of CMEpalooza (Wednesday, April 16) before submitting their name in your proposal. Or at least have some sort of contingency plan if they cannot participate.
7. We don’t want to limit creativity, so there isn’t a limit on the number of proposals you can submit, but please use common sense and be reasonable. We will likely only choose one proposal for which you are listed as the lead contact, so don’t submit 10 proposals or something crazy like that.
8. While it’s not a hard and fast rule, we’d prefer that you not simply submit a proposal that mirrors a presentation you gave at another conference within the last 12 months. At the very least, give it a unique spin.
9. We will notify you within a week of the abstract submission deadline if your proposal has been accepted or not.
10. If you have any questions, feel free to email Derek (thecmeguy@gmail.com) or Scott (scott@excaliburmeded.com), or find us at the Alliance conference this week.

I think that about covers it. I especially want to encourage people who have never presented at CMEpalooza to submit a proposal. We are always happy to have new faces at CMEpalooza. Maybe you are intimidated by getting up in a front of a room full of your colleagues and presenting material — not a problem with CMEpalooza. Maybe you are worried that your idea would be too “out there” for a traditional conference — not a problem with CMEpalooza. Maybe you are just too lazy to want to put together a slide deck for a presentation — so are we, which is why we often encourage our panelists to use few (if any) slides.

Give it a shot.

Click here for the CMEpalooza Spring 2025 Abstract Submission form

Hey there 2025 – nice to meet you. Be kind to everyone, please.

In the vein of comradery and community, we’re rolling out the 2025 CMEpalooza blog with one of our new features that we announced last month called “Ask Us Anything.” If you recall, this is your chance to get “expert” advice from Derek and I about whatever is on your mind. I know that people were initially reticent to write about their current issues until they saw the quality of advice that we were going to give, but we did get a few interesting submissions that we’ll address here and now.

If you have an issue you want us to help with, you can go here to submit your question(s)

Dear Derek and Scott,

I am in academia and nursing, and I need to understand other academic settings (outside of medicine) and how programming is supported. Are provider units self-sustaining or part of the school’s business functionality? I need to understand different business models on how academic centers are producing lovely programming, and I am sitting here struggling without a budget to develop enduring programs, obtaining instructional designers, paying speakers, etc. Any help or references to other members would be great!

Warmly,

It’s Not So Academic

DEREK: Given that 2025 will be my [checks notes] 25th(!) year working in CME/CE, I’ve had the opportunity to work for a number of different provider types, including twice in academia. Of those two academic CME providers, one was almost entirely self-funded and the other was a mix of institutionally and self-funded. In talking with a number of other academic providers, it appears of them fall into one of those two categories, with very few being 100% institutionally funded.

I won’t sit here and tell you that I am an expert on business models for academic centers. It’s a tough business, and I definitely remember muttering some words that would make my mother blush every time the “Dean’s tax” would cut out a portion of the already meager funds we were able to bring in. From my experience during this time, there were two tactics that helped us balance the budget:

1. Utilizing internal resources. One of the advantages of working at an academic center is that there may already be staff members in other departments that you can tap into for help. An academic center is no different than any other large organization in that so often the left hand has no idea what the right hand is doing. Did you know the Health Policy department has a full-time instructional designer on staff? Did you know the Office of Information Technology has a couple interns available to help with digital content? You might be surprised what is already available within your own organization.
2. Some academic providers bring in additional income by partnering with outside organizations (MEC’s, medical societies, etc.) to develop programs. This can be a convenient way to help fund internal programs without the workload of taking on all aspects of program development.

Lastly, if anyone reading this has any additional suggestions or recommendations, please feel free to add them in the comments section below.

SCOTT: Since I have no personal experience working in an academic center (although I have partnered with academic centers on numerous occasions), I’ll only add that you will find our CME community to be extraordinarily friendly and willing to offer advice. If you are a member of the Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions, you could search their member directory for other providers in your geographic area and perhaps reach out to connect with someone whose professional demographic seems similar to yours. Another option is to connect with someone in the Alliance’s Hospital and Health System member section (one of their current co-chairs is a former CMEpalooza intern) to see if they might have someone they could suggest you chat with.

Being creative in finding low (or no) cost solutions is a skill at a premium in our industry. There are ways to create quality education on a shoestring budget — it just isn’t necessarily as easy as when you have lots of dollars to throw around.

Dear Derek and Scott,

CE professionals are increasingly examining practice habits via claims data. This presents a new window through which CE planners can evaluate how well educational interventions are potentially addressing healthcare/practice gaps. However, access to this data in my limited experience is either sparce or very expensive. Can you identify or recommend avenues for collecting and analyzing claims data (ideally before and) following education delivery?

Fondly,

ClaimQuesting Coder

SCOTT: Ah, claims data. The holy grail of outcomes analysis. Look, we all understand the rationale – we want a more definitive way to objectively demonstrate that our education is (or isn’t) impacting how healthcare professionals operate on a day-to-day basis. Relying on self-reported intent to change is fine, but we all know that our learners aren’t exactly spending hours thinking about this and may or may not follow through on their intent. Logically, an analysis of claims data from our learners would be a great, nonintrusive way of measuring the impact of our education.

However, you are right to note that this is neither easy nor cheap. Healthcare systems don’t exactly willingly allow anyone to access their data willy nilly. While there are certain metrics they are required to report to broad databases, this really doesn’t help us much. What we need is to dive into specific points of information from our learners (and perhaps a control group of non-learners) that are directly tied to the education that we delivered. Not easy and not cheap.

Whenever an organization approaches me and says, “We have access to a claims database that will give you great data on your programs, and it’s only $25,000 extra per activity,” my first question to them is always, “What claims database are you talking about?” Usually, the answer I get is, “It’s proprietary,” which means that they won’t (or can’t) tell me, which means that my Spidey sense goes on full alert and I run away. Quickly.

The limited success I have had with claims databases recently involved working directly with regional Health Information Exchanges that have access to provider data across multiple healthcare systems in their area. But again, neither easy nor cheap, and you really need to think carefully about what you want to measure and assess to determine whether you have realistic expectations.

DEREK: I am going to take the easy way out here and state that I don’t have much to add beyond what Scott has already shared. The one comment I’ll make is that my experience over the past few years with using claims data for both targeted distribution and outcomes analysis has been positive. I agree with Scott that you should give careful consideration to the type and goal of your program, but overall, I think the value derived from claims data is worth the cost. My dad always told me that you get what you pay for, and I would argue that is the case with claims data.

Dear Derek and Scott,

Hi! There is a, well, I’m not sure what to call it but let’s just say it’s a sort of blog that rolls up into an event and back out again. The content is no longer core to my professional role, so I could/should just unsubscribe and move on, making space for something more directly relevant, but the people who run it are entertaining and clever, bordering on funny, which makes me hesitant to pull the plug. What should I do?

Hugs and Kisses,

Entertained but Unsure

DEREK: This is an easy one. All you need to do is quit your current role and find a new job that is more relevant to the content of your favorite blog. Problem solved!

In return, perhaps the people who run the blog can work on moving it from “bordering on funny” to “actually, kind of funny.” I recommend they include more jokes about their favorite sports teams, 80’s trivia, and Top 5 lists. Also, more cat videos. You can never go wrong with more cat videos.

SCOTT: I am fairly sure that cat videos stopped being trendy about the same time as Despacito disappeared from your radio dial. Please try to keep up with the rest of the world, Derek. Our friend here seems to be in dire straits, and I get it.

On the one hand, we only have so many hours in our working day to devote to nonessential content, and there are so many time sucks waiting to, well, suck our time away. On the other hand, if the two people who run this supposed blog are so entertaining and clever, I would be hesitant about pulling the plug on them. Qualities like this are in short supply these days.

The solution is rather simple — substitute those 10 minutes you usually devote to making your morning cup of coffee and instead devote them to mental caffeine by ingesting your favorite, wittiest, most debonair blog. That way, you aren’t sacrificing any of that crucial time you need on your job, but you also are living a more enjoyable life.

Remember, if you have an issue you want us to help with next time (any issue), you can go here to submit your question(s)