Tuesday, February 12, 2019

USA Office of CME Receives Interprofessional Continuing Education Joint Accreditation

The University of South Alabama Office of Continuing Medical Education (OCME) recently received four-year accreditation as a provider of Interprofessional Continuing Education (IPCE).

As a jointly accredited provider, USA OCME can now offer education and continuing education credits to physicians, nurses and pharmacists, together or separately, through the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education, the American Nurses Credentialing Center, and the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education. Other disciplines have been added including American Psychology Association and the Association of Social Work Boards.

Joint Accreditation offers organizations the opportunity to be simultaneously accredited to provide medicine, pharmacy, and nursing continuing education activities through a single, unified set of accreditation standards. Joint Accreditation promotes IPCE activities specifically designed to improve interprofessional collaborative practice in health care delivery to achieve a common goal of improving patient care.

"Joint Accreditation signifies to clinicians and to the public that continuing health care education activities provided by the USA Office of Continuing Medical Education meet the high standards for commercial support of Joint Accreditation," said Sharrie Cranford, director of continuing medical education at USA. "USA OCME’s educational programming ultimately serves all disciplines that may have an impact on patient outcomes."

The Joint Accreditation process rigorously evaluates the overall continuing health care education programs of institutions according to standards adopted by all three sponsoring organizations. USA OCME continuing education program is now part of a group of elite organizations in the United States - including major medical schools, national medical associations, hospitals and other medical education organizations - that have been awarded this accreditation status.

USA OCME also provides continuing education credits to psychologists, social workers and other professions for their educational activities at their annual meeting and in other live and enduring programs and materials throughout the year.

Learn more at www.jointaccreditation.org.