Directions In Psychiatry - Volume 35 Sample Course

Everyone needs continuing education. But who needs to be overwhelmed by it? For more than 35 years, Directions in Psychiatry remains the pre-eminent continuing medical education program for psychiatrists world-wide.
Original Lessons are presented each year and delivered to your home, office, or as digital downloads for your favorite electronic reading device.

Overall Objective: The objective of this continuing medical education program is to present participants with an expanded clinical skill set and raised awareness of clinically relevant issues in their profession. They will review key diagnostic criteria, cutting-edge treatment strategies, and practice points they can implement in the challenges of daily practice while providing evidence-based care to patients and clients suffering psychiatric and comorbid medical disorders. The expected outcomes include an increase in knowledge, competence, professionalism, and performance.

Target Audience: The primary target audience for this program includes, but is not limited to: psychiatrists, primary care physicians, psychiatric nurses, pharmacists, clinical psychologists, and social workers. Clinicians who have caseloads composed significantly of individuals with psychiatric disorders, and comorbid medical illnesses will find this course particularly useful.

Course Information

In accordance with Criterion 2 of the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education’s (ACCME) education and planning policies, Hatherleigh actively incorporates the educational needs of our program participants into our CME curricula and addresses the professional practice gaps by utilizing the following methods, such as, but not limited to:

1. Compiling monthly summaries from activity evaluation forms to identify requested and needed areas of coverage in future curricula;
2. Conducting state board research on required and emerging areas of educational initiatives;
3. Researching national institutions such as the American Psychiatric Association;
4. Including a Breakdown of Tested Areas form in all CME programs to see areas of coverage and identify areas in need of more coverage; and
5. Conducting research in the literature, major licensing boards such as the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, and major meetings such as the American Psychiatric Association’s annual meeting to assess emerging research and trends in psychiatry.

Hatherleigh identifies professional practice gaps in similar vein as the needs assessment data. Hatherleigh assesses professional practice gaps that help shape and develop our curricula to directly address those areas in the areas of knowledge, competence, and performance. Hatherleigh utilizes methods, such as, but not limited to the following:

1. Staff and management discussions, data from other organizations with similar membership and audience, member opinion surveys, activity post-tests evaluations, input from advisory board consultants and topic experts, and from government regulations with which physicians must comply. These gaps and needs are incorporated into Hatherleig’s activities through learning objectives that articulate knowledge, competence, and/or performance expectations for the learner following participation in the activity.
2. Compiling a monthly summary of responses from program evaluation forms to assess what participants list as professional practice gaps in practice and learning.
3. Conducting research in the literature: abstracts/full journal articles, government produced documents such as the Center for Disease Control which describes educational needs and physician practice gaps.
4. Reviewing state and national board re-certification requirements.
5. Informal regular communication with our program members.

Conflict of Interest Disclosure Policy: Faculty members were selected for their expertise and, most often, on the strength of their presentations from previously published papers or symposia. Hatherleigh Medicial Education staff, contributing program faculty, and advisory board members, must disclose their relationships (also on behalf of their immediate family members), if they exist, with commercial and/or pharmaceutical companies prior to Hatherleigh Medical Education’s distribution and publication of their contributions to Hatherleigh Medical Education CME programs. Any aforementioned relationship that poses a potential conflict of interest will be resolved prior to publication/distribution of the CME activity, and proper notification disclosed to program participants prior to the start of the activity. Disclosure of any off-label medication usage for indications that are not currently approved by the Federal Drug Administration discussed within the CME content will be disclosed within the lesson.

Duration of CME Status: Directions in Psychiatry begins May 28, 2015, and the preliminary expiration date is December 31, 2018. At that point, the Hatherleigh Medical Director and the editorial staff will review the CME material to determine whether the program continues to be consistent with current accreditation guidelines and standards of care. A determination will be made as to whether the program can be used to earn full CME credit after that date.