After COVID-19, CME Learners Will Still Want These Things
The coronavirus pandemic has completely upended the online learning paradigm. Before 2020, online CME was still the proverbial new kid on the block. More providers were starting to deliver enduring and webinar activities, but in-person meetings and conferences remained a major force in the CME world.
Today, all of that has changed. If your learners weren’t getting CME online before 2020, they almost certainly are now.
And as learners’ CME experiences evolve, so do their expectations. In the pre-pandemic “old days,” many learners took it for granted that certain CME-related business occurred offline. Nowadays, learners assume they can earn CME online and complete ancillary CME tasks via the web.
That reality has major implications for the future of CME. Here are a few things your learners are going to want, even after life returns to normal.
Online CME activities
The ability to complete CME activities online is perhaps the most obvious thing learners will expect long after the pandemic is over. Even those who return to CME live meetings are likely to assume that education providers can and do offer online activities in addition to in-person options. These activities are convenient to learners who can’t or don’t want to travel to obtain CME.
Throughout the COVID era, we’ve seen CME providers transition from face-to-face live meetings to online events. We’ve also seen content that normally would have been delivered in a live setting converted into enduring or on-demand activities.
Learners have become accustomed to earning CME credit this way. That’s not going to change after the pandemic — especially since many learners will find they prefer the convenience of completing CME online.
Self-directed CME experience
One thing learners get from a CME/CE-focused platform like Rievent is the ability to chart their own path. With just a single login to a single interface, they can:
- Browse for activities in a dedicated catalog
- Select and begin new activities right away
- Pause any activity they’re working on and return to it later
- Complete activities according to their own schedule
- Use any device for CME
- Opt for enduring, journal, webinar, or virtual meeting activities, depending on what their provider offers
And they can do all of the above without juggling multiple interfaces, contacting providers directly, or setting aside time to attend a meeting. In other words, they’re free to pursue CME the way that they choose.
For busy professionals accustomed to working CME into an already jam-packed schedule, online learning can be liberating. It’s not something they’ll want to give up, even after it’s possible to gather in a conference room again.
CME document access
If there’s one sore spot that’s common among nearly all the CME providers who come to us, it’s certificates and transcripts. This point dovetails with the self-directed CME experience we described above. It’s such a big issue, however, that it deserves a callout of its own.
In most cases, everything from creating and distributing certificates to fulfilling transcript requests is frustrating for learners and providers. No matter how your legacy process works, it’s probably cumbersome and time consuming. As more learners become accustomed to online CME, one thing they’re likely to demand — and many already are demanding it — is the ability to download certificates and transcripts on the fly.
And yes, those documents will need to be up-to-date when learners download them.
As a fully integrated CME system, Rievent automatically updates learners’ certificates and transcripts the moment they complete an activity. Those documents are also readily available to learners through the same interface. They can finish an activity and immediately download or print an up-to-date transcript just seconds later.
No manual requests. No waiting around for documents to be updated and sent.
It’s less work for learners and way less work for you! Essentially, learners can log in, choose an activity, complete it, earn credit, and download an updated certificate without your intervention.
Why not give learners what they want?
If you don’t offer these things, you can bet learners will ask about them!
Ultimately, your learners want CME to be as seamless as possible. By bringing more of their CME experience to the web, you can meet their post-pandemic expectations for online education. Instead of being the exception, you can be the standard to which they compare all other options.
Can you guess who they’ll turn to for CME from now on?