Continuing Education Mission

CME Purpose
The educational activities of SAMBA foster the continuing professional development of healthcare providers. The offerings are intended to enhance physician and other healthcare professionals' training and performance for the purpose of improving health delivery and educational outcomes. The Society is committed to assessing the achievement of educational objectives of the Continuing Education Program through qualitative and quantitative methods. These expectations of the SAMBA CME program is achieve through the Society’s Continuing Medical Education Mission.

 

The mission of the SAMBA Continuing Education Program is:

•   To provide a learning environment in which the physician and other health professionals may enhance their professional growth in cognitive and procedural areas of ambulatory anesthesia for the purpose of improving the quality of patient care;
•   To foster an environment that facilitates the exchange of information on the practice of ambulatory anesthesia between individual members and non-members through continuing education as an essential part of each participant's personal lifelong development;
•   To develop innovative continuing education activities based on state-of-the-art technologies used to design, implement, assess and evaluate continuing education activities and the Continuing Education Program as a whole;
•   To increase the Society’s capabilities in measuring and understanding the needs of its physician and non-physician audiences through increased research into the educational needs of those segments of both the SAMBA membership and non-member audiences served by the organization;
•    To partner with other organizations and institutions, under the clinical and scientific guidance of the SAMBA Committee on Education, so as to offer expanded educational activities that reach practitioners in ambulatory environments nationally and internationally;
•    To meet or exceed the Essential Areas and Policies of the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) and the guidelines of the American Medical Association's Physician's Recognition Award (AMA/PRA).

 

Content
The content of the SAMBA Continuing Education Program shall relate to the delivery of treatment in an ambulatory setting, based on the needs of the multidisciplinary team of professionals in that field. Topics of education shall include clinical issues, education of the results of research in the field of ambulatory anesthesia, and the management of care delivered in the ambulatory setting. Core clinical areas of focus shall include ambulatory anesthesia, ambulatory surgery and its subspecialties such as pediatrics and pharmacology.

 

Target Audience
The target audience of the SAMBA Continuing Education Program shall comprise members of the anesthesia care team, including clinical and research scientists, anesthesiologists, surgeons and other healthcare professionals interested in ambulatory anesthesia.

 

Types of Activities
The types of activities offered by the SAMBA Continuing Education Program shall include, but are not limited to, live conferences and workshops, presentations of selected scientific papers and platform sessions.

 

Expected Results of the Program
As a result of these educational activities, SAMBA fosters the continuing professional development of healthcare providers. The offerings are intended to enhance physician and other healthcare professionals' training and performance for the purpose of improving health delivery and educational outcomes. The Society is committed to assessing the achievement of educational objectives of the Continuing Education Program through qualitative and quantitative methods.

 

The CME Program of the Society
The Society achieves its Continuing Medical Education mission through the strength of its CME program, including (1) comprehensive annual meeting programs featuring plenary panel session, workshops, open forums, in-depth preconvention workshops and poster presentation discussion sessions; (2) topical mid year meetings designed to present state of the art information on issues and controversies important to physicians in the safe delivery of anesthesia in an ambulatory setting; (3) leadership by the organization’s Board of Director and Committee on Education; and (4) administrative support by a major specialty medical society very familiar with issues facing the practice of anesthesiology and the subspecialty of ambulatory anesthesia.

The Society’s CME programs are developed to provide participants with an in-depth educational experience that will long stay with them in their professional development, including new ideas they can immediately implement in their practices.

Since its inception, the Society for Ambulatory Anesthesia has made tremendous strives to increase the educational value of its Continuing Medical Education program and meeting challenges through the year. Future challenges facing the Society’s CME program are directly related to current medico-economics. Physicians are under increased pressure to “produce” while experience decreases in reimbursements. The pressures to increase productivity erode into non-clinical time needed for new research. Cost-containment efforts by administrators reduce a physician’s opportunity to participate in educational programs.

Challenges faced by this organization’s CME program are shared by other organizations, target audiences having lesser time to attend such activities and their demands to maximize their educational investment in the shortest possible time. The Society for Ambulatory Anesthesia is already taking steps to meet these challenges including the introducing of longer hours to its educational programs. The Society also recognizes that the Internet presents an opportunity for the organization to assist its target audience achieve their need for convenient, quality CME programs.

 

Vision
The Society is committed to providing high-quality continuing education activities for physicians and other healthcare professionals, the public, and policy makers regarding the optimal delivery of ambulatory anesthesia. The Society envisions a system of ambulatory anesthesia in which ill and injured persons obtain care that promotes the desired outcomes for individuals and society and is consistent with established and emerging knowledge.