Hi Tom: The issue of disclosure is important but different obviously from course objectives.
My thoughts on disclosure come from providing continuing health professional education for 25 years without taking a penny from industry or anyone for that matter. Neither disclosure nor the absence of industry ties removes bias - it never has and never will.
1) we run a yearly 2 day course in Vancouver for all health care professionals - primarily family docs and pharmacists - on how to use medications properly. 400 people attend the course - we sell out basically every year and we just finished our 24th year. We do it without any sponsorship yet we can still make a profit (not huge but enough - it's amazing how much hotels charge for a muffin and coffee).
You can find information about our course and our newly renamed podcast "Best Science (BS) Podcast - BS without the BS" - at therapeuticseducation.org - we used to be a part of the Therapeutics Initiative. There are now 2 other sites (not affiliated with us) in Canada that run similar successful courses - they stole our process and we love that they did.
2) while we do NOT take any sponsorship we DO sometimes have speakers who have received funding etc from industry. Why do we do this? Well there is no such thing as an unbiased speaker. Many speakers with industry ties are outstanding teachers and great clinicians. We have, over time, identified a stable of speakers who we know are good and present a "balanced" view of the evidence. As long as they disclose their conflicts we are totally OK with them having this sort of conflict. We want good, evidence-based, thoughtful, balanced and entertaining presenters - whether they have some industry ties is irrelevant as long as they are disclosed - we let the audience judge based on content etc.
Speakers, regardless of industry ties, LOVE speaking at our course because we provide an environment that allows them to speak their mind and the course organizers and audience challenge them and make sure they can back up what they say. I am very aware of speakers who have NO industry ties and they are so biased, in both directions, that we just don't/can't invite them.
Those are my biased thoughts on this issue.
James McCormack, BSc(Pharm), Pharm D
Professor
Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences
UBC, Vancouver, Canada
therapeuticseducation.org
604-603-7898
On 2013-04-17, at 11:22 AM, Tom Yates <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> Hi Pat,
>
> I'm aware of no evidence that disclosure removes bias. My view is that
> it is best, where possible, to get people without a stake in the topic
> under discussion to summarise the evidence.
>
> My conflict of interest is that I'm trying to get an accreditation
> scheme off the ground for CME delivered independent of industry and by
> unconflicted speakers - see www.conflictfreeconferences.com.
>
> People says its not possible but there is loads of good stuff out
> there - e.g. GP Update in the UK and the Therapeutics Initiative in
> Canada.
>
> All the best,
> Tom
>
>
> On 17/04/2013, Patricia Warner <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> Agreed, speakers must complete disclosures of relevant financial information
>> concerning biases. If there is possible biases, the CME has a policy
>> designed to deal with that. And at the end of the presentation, the
>> learners are asked whether or not they perceived any bias and if so, what.
>> If the speaker did not adhere to the policy, the speaker will not ever be
>> able to speak at one of our events again.
>>
>> Patricia "Pat" Warner, MLIS
>> Hospital Librarian/CME Coordinator
>> Memorial Hospital at Gulfport
>> 4500 13th St
>> PO Box 1810
>> Gulfport MS 39502
>> 228-865-3616
>> 228-865-3135 (fax)
>>
>>
>> ________________________________________
>> From: Evidence based health (EBH) [[log in to unmask]] on
>> behalf of Makretsov, Nikita [PH] [[log in to unmask]]
>> Sent: Wednesday, April 17, 2013 12:19 PM
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: Evidence for learning objectives in continuing health care
>> education events
>>
>> Hello James,
>>
>> The bigger question is whether the CME is free from ANY industrial bias. The
>> objectives could still be very lovely.
>>
>>
>> Nik (Nikita) A. Makretsov,
>> University of British Columbia
>> Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
>> 1081 Burrard St, Vancouver, BC, V6Z1Y6
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Evidence based health (EBH)
>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of McCormack, James
>> Sent: Tuesday, April 16, 2013 5:43 PM
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Evidence for learning objectives in continuing health care
>> education events
>>
>> Hello:
>>
>> Not sure if this question is appropriate for this list serve but maybe the
>> answer will be interesting to some of the group.
>>
>> MY QUESTION
>> Does providing participants at continuing health care educational events
>> with a list of 2-3 objectives for each talk improve knowledge uptake or
>> provide any measurable useful outcome? Is there is any evidence that
>> participants even use them etc?
>>
>> I have had a quick look and have been unable to find any evidence but I may
>> not be looking in the right places.
>>
>> BACKGROUND
>>
>> 1) I give dozens of different "evidence-based" talks a year and for each one
>> of them as part of an educational accreditation process I'm "forced" to
>> create 2-3 learning objectives which need to be prominently displayed on my
>> handout and presented at the beginning of my talk. While it is not a huge
>> amount of work, when you have to do it dozens of times for different topics
>> it is an added administrative burden especially given that I often do talks
>> for no honourarium. However, if there was evidence that people really used
>> them or if it improved outcomes I would have no problem doing it.
>>
>> 2) I recently asked 100's of participants at 2-3 conferences if any of them
>> ever used these learning objectives and not one of them said they did. Maybe
>> it was a biased sample but the lack of a yes response was deafening.
>>
>> Does anyone know of any evidence that providing objectives improves any
>> educational experience (even in a health care curriculum) or is it purely a
>> philosophy whose benefit is taken for granted.
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> James McCormack, BSc(Pharm), Pharm D
>> Professor
>> Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences
>> UBC, Vancouver, Canada
>>
>> therapeuticseducation.org
>>
>> 604-603-7898
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