ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: In order to achieve points for the CME certificate of the German Medical Council ("Arztekammer") the reader of a CME article in a medical journal has to fill in an evaluation form that includes knowledge assessment. This article summarizes the data of the first ten CME presentations in the "Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift". METHODS: 4481 completed data sets were evaluated by chi-square and binomial tests using SPSS version 10.0. RESULTS: 85% of the participants were specialists, mainly in internal medicine or surgery: those working in private practice or a hospital took part. The great majority had received their licence one to 30 years ago. The topics dealt with diseases which were not uniformly often seen in clinical practice. The individually perceived changes in the strategy of diagnosis and therapy, induced by the CME article, was mainly dependent on qualification and specialization of the reader as well as on the frequency, with which the reader had been treating the respective disorder. The articles were appreciated by specialists as well as by non-specialists. Knowledge assessment was largely made on the basis of the article alone and was successfully passed by nearly 90% of the participants. CONCLUSION: For the first time this article provides detailed data on CME activities in a nation-wide available German medical journal and thus forms the basis for discussing further the definition of quality criteria for CME articles in medical journals.
Subject(s)
Certification , Education, Medical, Continuing , Periodicals as Topic , Binomial Distribution , Chi-Square Distribution , Education, Medical, Continuing/standards , Germany , Humans , Medicine , Periodicals as Topic/standards , Physician Executives , SpecializationABSTRACT
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: For Germany there exist only very little data concerning the practice of continuous medical education (CME). The introduction of the CME certificate has made it possible to gather data about the CME activities and their evaluation which are presented here for the northrhenian chamber of physicians. METHODS: In 2002 the northrhenian academy for CME has certified more than 5500 CME activities and more than 2000 maintenance-of-quality group activities. In addition the evaluation forms of the first 4486 consecutive participants have been evaluated,including those of the northrhenian CME congress on the isle of Norderney. RESULTS: 94 % of the participants had received their license between 1 and 30 years ago and 81 % attended > or = 1 CME activity per month. Currently there exist only very few digital media certified for CME, which is dominated by oral presentations of which 85 % have gained > or = 2 points for the certificate (150 points in 3 years). General practitioners and internists together represented nearly 40 % of the participants, the others represent a broad spectrum of specialties. Topics and presentation were rated as of high quality and clinical relevance, which was also true for sponsored CME. CONCLUSION: Certified CME is currently dominated by oral presentations which mostly take place outside the working hours and which are rated as of high quality and clinical relevance.
Subject(s)
Certification , Education, Medical, Continuing , Family Practice , Germany , Humans , Internal Medicine , Medicine , SpecializationABSTRACT
The interpretation of cardiotocograms still relies primarily on visual analysis. This form of monitoring remains labour intensive and, being dependent on the training and experience of the specialist responsible, also subject to erroneous interpretation. Computer-aided cardiotocogram analysis has, in spite of encouraging successes, still not found wide application in everyday clinical routine. To achieve this, the programming system must be easy to operate, userfriendly and reliable. A program system for fully automatic cardiotocogram analysis is envisioned which runs on standard commercially-available personal computers. A clear graphic representation of the traces also permits visual assessment on the computer screen. The system described integrates the main assessment criteria of cardiotocogram analysis which can then be extended owing to the open system architecture used in the programming. Completely new analysis algorithms have given the evaluating system the capability of fully-automatic pattern recognition of fetal heart rate signals and uterine motility. An essential requirement of computer-aided cardiotocogram analysis is thereby fulfilled. Work is now focusing on the exact classification of the various types of deceleration and an extension of the capabilities of tocogram analysis. There should be nothing to hinder integration of the system into everyday clinical routine and connect it to obstetrical databases.
