New ACCME Changes to Enhance Interprofessional Continuing Education (IPCE)

You already know the benefits of active collaboration with your healthcare professionals and others within your facilities. Your interprofessional team is a diverse one that learns with, from, and about each other when it comes to working with patients, families, caregivers, and communities to deliver the highest quality of care. According to the American Council for Continuing Medical Education’s (ACCME) Criterion 23, this can involve your physicians working with optometrists, nurses working with physical therapists, respiratory therapists working with pharmacists, or CRNAs working with psychologists. As for your healthcare professionals, Interprofessional Continuing Education (IPCE) provides them the knowledge to improve patient outcomes. This is where the ACCME comes in.

What changes has the ACCME made to enhance your IPCE, and how can you get the job done?

Healthcare Is a Team Sport

Like in any sport, everyone in the clinical setting works together to provide care. The whole idea behind IPCE is that it brings clinicians together to foster respect for each individual’s roles on the healthcare team. If they don’t succeed, patients feel unheard, untreated, or like they’re not getting the best care or positive outcomes.

What to Know about Criterion 23

Criterion 23 rewards IPCE in which members of interprofessional teams from at least two professions from accredited providers come together for the planning and delivery. The idea is to have these teams learn with, from, and about each other to enable effective collaborative practice and improve their patients’ health outcomes.

What’s the ACCME Doing?

The Joint Accreditation™ for Interprofessional Continuing Education is offered by the ACCME through collaboration with the original co-founders, Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE) and the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ACCC).

Other collaborating medical associations include:

• American Academy of PAs (APPA)
• Association of Regulatory Boards of Optometry’s Council of Optometric Practitioner Education (ARBO/COPE)
• Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB)
• American Psychological Association (APA)
• American Dental Association’s Continuing Education Recognition Program (ADA CERP)

The ACCME has made changes that enhance the IPCE for your healthcare professionals. As one of the co-founders for Joint Accreditation, it provides a streamlined way for organizations to offer continuing education (CE) without needing to obtain separate accreditations.

If your organization wants to become eligible, you must show that at least 25% of your CE is planned by and for two or more individual professions. Healthcare teams must have the structure and processes in place and be fully functional for more than eighteen months. You’ll also need to take part in the Joint Accreditation process and show compliance and/or be in good standing if you’re already accredited by the ACCME or any other collaborating accreditors.

Benefits of Getting Joint Accreditation for Interprofessional Continuing Education

There are numerous benefits to gaining your IPCE in line with the ACCME:

• It increases your operational effectiveness, which saves you time, money, and resources. You can leverage a single process instead of obtaining multiple accreditations.
• As a CME provider, Joint Accreditation offers additional options. When you’re accredited separately, this means you can also produce education for your healthcare team of learners. When you’re awarded your Joint Accreditation, you’ll be able to offer education that’s not team-related.
• It will also continue your ability to keep your program in good stead, as strategic partners in team-based patient care and overall healthcare improve.

IPCE: The Right Tech Can Get You Ready for IPCE

EthosCE’s Learning Management System (LMS) lets your organization provide quality IPCE for your healthcare team in accordance with the Joint Accreditation for Interprofessional Continuing Education criteria. EthosCE provides your organization with an enterprise-grade technology through a single platform so you can easily meet your Criterion 23 compliance and help your multiple healthcare professionals gain their IPCE credits without having to follow a separate accreditation for each profession.

EthosCE gives you a robust data analytics suite for actionable data management, as well as curriculum tools that give you the ability to offer solid courses that learners want to stay in rather than fail to complete. You can automate data, reporting, and PARS submissions, and the all-critical ACCME innovation requirements allow for animation and video integrations. You will benefit from the EthosCE all-in-one CME management platform that empowers you with automated administrative tasks like emails and payment processing, along with classroom management and digital publishing when you need it.

Get It Done the First Time

At EthosCE, we understand the challenges of Criterion 23 in your IPCE accreditation, planning, and delivery. We know how critical it is to get it done right the first time when it comes to team-based education and success.

To learn how EthosCE can enhance the Interprofessional Continuing Education of your healthcare teams, connect with us to schedule a free 1-on-1 demo with one of our specialists today!