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>>McMAHON: We're excited to announce our new commendation criteria. In this process to evolve commendation, we asked you to share those commendable practices in your institutions that the ACCME system should recognize and value. And we listened to you. This final version is based on much of the feedback that you've given us from the CME community. We wanted to ensure that the criteria would be attainable for all different CME provider types. The final version is designed to be both achievable and meaningful. Our goal in this process is to encourage the community to aim for even higher levels of achievement and we really wanted to encourage and reward accredited CME providers for implementing best practices in pedagogy, engagement, evaluation, change management, and for focusing on what really matters to clinicians in generating meaningful outcomes.

>>McMAHON: In the criteria you'll see 16 criteria divided into 5 categories. Promotes team-based education, addresses public health priorities, enhances skills, demonstrates educational leadership, and achieves outcomes. You'll also see that we've designed the menu for flexibility. You should choose 7 criteria from any of the categories and 1 from the outcomes category, summing to a total of 8 of the available 16. We determine that one criteria from the outcomes category is mandatory for achieving commendation because the CME community needs to demonstrate the relevance, value and impact of CME on our learners and the care they provide. 

>>McMAHON: Outcomes will enable us as a community to identify more effective ways of delivering CME and contributing to healthcare improvement. Each criteria is accompanied by a rationale, critical elements and standards to help you understand and meet the expectations. And you'll see that the standards for compliance have been modified substantially in response to your extensive feedback. Engagement with the commendation criteria is optional. Organizations can choose to remain accredited by demonstrating compliance with our core criteria numbers 1 through 13. We'll also have a transitional phase during which accredited providers that choose to aim to achieve accreditation with  commendation will have the option of demonstrating compliance with the current or the new commendation criteria. I encourage you to review these criteria with your staff, volunteers and leadership, and discuss together how the criteria can support your strategic plan and determine which criteria are achievable and appropriate for you and your learners.

>>McMAHON: Remember that we're to help. We realize that choosing to achieve these commendation criteria might mean new changes for your work and your programs. We plan to do everything we can to support you and the CME community's successful adoption of the new criteria and evolve your educational strategy to meet best practices. We'll prepare educational resources and training for recognized accreditors, accredited CME providers, volunteers and all of our stakeholders. Send us your questions and ideas for tools and resources that can help you create your implementation plan. Join our webinars to learn more and ask your questions. We appreciate your high level of participation in this process, all of your feedback, and we look forward to working together to ensure our community's successful implementation of the new criteria to achieve this shared goal of advancing quality and achieving outcomes in postgraduate medical education.

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This is a transcript of Introduction to the Menu of New Criteria for Accreditation: Video Commentary with Graham McMahon, MD, MMSc, President and CEO, ACCME.

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