Practice-based learning and improvement.

Workplace learning is becoming increasingly important in all fields. While workplace learning in medicine, also called practice-based learning and improvement (PBLI) is not new, understanding how it works and how it fits with an individual physician's continuing professional development is new. In this article, we describe seven issues associated with PBLI and then pose questions for reflections, as continuing medical education (CME) planners consider working with PBLI.

Specific psychosocial and behavioral outcomes from the systemic lupus erythematosus self-help course.

This study tested hypotheses about the consistency of specified outcomes with strength of program treatment indexed by time spent in a given activity in the Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Self-Help (SLESH) course. Participants had significant increases in enabling skills and in use of relaxation and exercise activities. Participants also had significantly less depression.

A system for approving, monitoring, and recording CME activities in a university hospital setting.

The increased demand that mandatory continuing education requirements place on an academic physician's time and the conviction that continued learning is best when that learning is related to patient care were the impetus for developing a continuing education system in the University of Michigan Hospital for medical faculty and medical staff. Using the capability to co-sponsor continuing medical education, the University of Michigan Medical School established a quality assessment mechanism that enabled approval of a variety of ongoing instructional activities in the hospital setting for continuing education credit.