AAFP's LearningLink Launches Diabetes Series

The AAFP's online classroom, LearningLink, has launched the first activity of a new four-part CME series dubbed Type 2 Diabetes 2009.

The initial activity, Highlights of Current Evidence and Clinical Recommendations, offers an overview of the disease and encompasses three webcasts:

Neil Skolnik, M.D., of Jenkintown, Pa., presents the webcasts. Skolnik is a professor of family and community medicine at the Temple University School of Medicine in Philadelphia. He also is the associate director of the family practice residency program at Abington Memorial Hospital in Abington, Pa.

The series reviews and applies evidence-based diabetes management guidelines for family physicians. In addition to the webcasts, delivery platforms include a slide-driven lecture, an expert panel discussion and video case dramatizations. Downloadable resources provide evidence-based recommendations, practice tools and point-of-care applications.

The second activity, Quality Management of Type 2 Diabetes: Approach to Medical Treatment, is scheduled to launch in August. The third activity, Optimizing Glycemic Control and Improving Outcomes, and the fourth, Challenges and Barriers to Effective Management: Case-Based Skills Application, are expected to launch in November and December, respectively.

The program is supported by grants from GlaxoSmithKline, sanofi-aventis and Takeda Pharmaceuticals North America.

LearningLink debuted in July 2008 as a new direction in education -- an alternative to the "one-off" programs in which participants are briefly exposed to a clinical topic. LearningLink focuses on one therapeutic area through a series of interconnected activities delivered during a 12- to 18-month period, providing comprehensive, longitudinal learning.

Participants' progress is tracked in the aggregate, and those data are used to develop subsequent educational interventions.