Activity Roles & Guidelines

The Activity Director Role

The Activity Director must be a UConn faculty member appointed from within a UConn Health clinical/ancillary department. In this role, the Activity Director is responsible for planning, conducting, and evaluating the CME event, ultimately the one who will be signing off on all the activity mitigation of conflicts (both in content and fiscal) and management of fiscal components. The responsibilities of the activity director include but are not limited to:

  • Communicating the learning objectives and other relevant planning information to all speakers or faculty responsible for conducting or facilitating the educational activity.
  • Communicating the learning objectives and other important information to the target audience.
  • Mitigating and managing any potential conflicts of interest to eliminate bias in the planning and implementation of the activity.
  • Attesting to the accuracy and completeness of the CME application.
  • Submitting a complete and accurate final report on the activity, including evaluation results, to the Office of Community and Continuing Medical Education within six weeks of the activity’s completion.
  • The activity director can be an author/speaker within the activity as well.
  • The activity director also leads the planning committee and is by way of the nature of the role, a default planning member.

 Who Else Is Involved Along With the CME Activity Director

  • Co-Activity Director: This role is optional. This person jointly shares all administrative and operational duties of the Activity Director as described above. The co-director can be someone who is affiliated in a jointly provided activity not from a UConn Health related department. In certain circumstances, our office will require an activity to have a co-activity director if the activity director has some sort of financial conflict in relations to the content areas of the activity. The co-activity director can be an author/speaker within the activity as well, and by way of the nature of the role, a default planning member.
  • Activity Admin: This role is required. This is the person who is responsible for all administrative support and essentially administers and operates the logistics, the paperwork, and interfaces with the CME office on each tasks that needs to be done. This roles is central and critical for any activity to run smoothly and successfully. The activity admin usually does not fulfill a role of author/speaker, however this person can assist in content planning and selection if required. In addition, by way of the nature of the role, also default planning member.
  • Independent Peer Reviewer: This role is optional. This person is primarily selected when required by the CME office, however an activity may decided to elect to use this role as part of their planning committee. Usually in instances where the activity director may not be a content expert in the area of focus, there are conflicts of interests with the activity director or planning members. When a recommendation of an independent peer reviewer is made, this person is identified as such, becomes a member of the planning committee.  This person sole role is to be an independent peer reviewer, and should not hold any additional role such as author/speaker within the activity.
  • Planning Members: This role is required. The CME activity that is being planned must have at least 1 additional person who is not the activity director, co-director, or activity admin to serve on the activity's planning committee. An activity can have as many planning members as they deem to be needed, commonly we typically see 2-3 additional planning members. Planning members can also be authors and speakers within the activity as well.

 

Activity Guidelines for Content

As an ACCME accredited provider of CME, the UConn CME program is committed to ensuring fair balance, independence, objectivity, and scientific rigor in all its sponsored programs. As such, Activity Directors of all UConn CME activities are required to ensure the identification and resolution of any concerns with regard to integrity and independence. Downloaded PDF of Guidelines.

If the activity director discloses any commercial or industry relationships with an ineligible company either in the initial CME program application meeting, on their declaration disclosure form, or at the CME office’s request, an alternate reviewer must be appointed. An alternate reviewer could be either an Co-activity Director, activity planning committee member or an assigned other Independent Peer Reviewer. The alternate reviewer should be an expert in the field being presented and must be approved in advance either during the preliminary proposal or formal application process by the Medical Director of CME.

In addition, the alternate reviewer must be listed as part of the planning committee, as well as have a completed Declaration Disclosure form. The identified reviewer must understand that their role is to ensure the balance and scientific rigor of the program as presented to the CME office. Once the activity is formally approved by the CME office, the Activity Director/Alternate Reviewer responsibilities will be as follows:

  • All abstracts and disclosure forms must be reviewed in advance of presentations by the Activity Director/Alternate Reviewer. All presentations given by CME faculty who appear to have a possible conflict, as determined by the Activity must be monitored during the meeting. (ACCME Standard 1: Ensure Content Validation)
  • The Activity Director/Alternate Reviewer must be in attendance for the activity itself and must monitor any presentations where a potential conflict has been identified. In addition, he/she will be expected to comment upon the overall program and individual presentations for scientific rigor, evidence-based treatment recommendations, balance, and objectivity. (ACCME Standard 2: Prevent Commercial Bias and Marketing in Accredited Continuing Education)
  • In the case of concurrent sessions, more than one person must be available who is knowledgeable in the field and approved prior to the event by the application process to attend sessions deemed to have a potential bias. (ACCME Standard 2: Prevent Commercial Bias and Marketing in Accredited Continuing Education)
  • The Activity Director/Alternate Reviewer may determine prior to an activity, as a result of a review of the slides or discussion with the presenter, that the perceived conflict has been resolved and will confirm this in writing by documenting as such on-speaker declaration disclosure form under the Activity Director section. (Standard 3: Identify, Mitigate, and Disclose Relevant Financial Relationships)
  • The Activity Director/Alternate Reviewer may elect to work with one or more associates who must also complete a declaration disclosure and be approved through the application process. (Standard 3: Identify, Mitigate, and Disclose Relevant Financial Relationships)
  • The Activity Director/Alternate Reviewer will confirm that all meeting arrangements (i.e. meeting rooms, meals, etc.) are in compliance with UConn CME and ACCME Rules standards, and guidelines. (ACCME Standard 4: Standard 4: Manage Commercial Support Appropriately & ACCME Standard 5: Standard 5: Manage Ancillary Activities Offered in Conjunction with Accredited Continuing Education)

Additional Information

Activity Director’s Key Steps Info Sheet Identification, Mitigation, and Disclosure of Relevant Financial Relationships

Guide for Peer Review: Ensuring that Clinical Content is Valid

SPEAKER PRESENTATION SLIDES OR MATERIALS

Presentations must not use logos or trademarks, although factual references to companies, products and services in generic font are permitted; however, educational materials that are part of a continuing medical education activity cannot contain any advertising, trade names or product group messages. This especially applies to speakers who are from an ineligible company (as defined below).

OWNERS AND EMPLOYEES OF INELIGIBLE COMPANIES

ACCME clearly defined that you must exclude owners or employees of ineligible companies: Review the information about financial relationships to identify individuals who are owners or employees of ineligible companies. These individuals must be excluded from controlling content or participating as planners or faculty in accredited education. There are three exceptions to this exclusion—employees of ineligible companies can participate as planners or faculty in these specific situations:

  1. When the content of the activity is not related to the business lines or products of their employer/company.
  2. When the content of the accredited activity is limited to basic science research, such as pre-clinical research and drug discovery, or the methodologies of research, and they do not make care recommendations.
  3. When they are participating as technicians to teach the safe and proper use of medical devices, and do not recommend whether or when a device is used.

Refer to: ACCME Standard 3