Welcome to the ArcheMedX Blog
Welcome to the ArcheMedX blog.
Our goal for this site is to share our thoughts on the science of CME with a bent towards the online learning and assessment, but if history serves as evidence we will be commenting on much, much more.
ArcheMedX was founded with one clear purpose in mind, “to build the structure that simplifies learning.” And over the past year Joel and I have spent hundreds of hours exploring what works and what is missing in medical education. What has become increasingly obvious is that the traditional focus of developing and delivering de novo content to clinician learners has failed to have the impact that is needed to sufficiently and efficiently advance healthcare. Instead we believe that a new model must evolve – a model in which a ubiquitous learning architecture is engineered.
We have interviewed hundreds of clinicians, medical educators, and informaticists in an effort to understand the purpose this learning architecture must serve. Our conclusion: the cognitive process of learning is built upon a series of natural learning actions. If structured properly, these learning actions allow an adult learner to extract critical insights and apply more meaningful lessons to clinical practice.
But this conclusion is in many way just the beginning of our journey. Now we must dig through the body of knowledge that informs learning theory in medicine, along with the mountains of approaches and models being piloted in other fields of adult learning, informatics, motivation design, and behavior change. This has become a call to action to explore ideas wherever they may lie so that we may truly understand how our learning architecture must evolve.
By subscribing to this blog you will be able to engage with us along this journey. While we share the collective goal of improving medical education, perhaps we are coming at it with a very unique perspective. By engaging with us in the dialog, you may become informed about what we are up to, but more than this, you will have the ability to help us shape our models in unforeseen ways.
It is our more sincere hope that what we share herein, and the conversations that ensue, will benefit us all.
Thank you,
Brian and Joel
Written by Brian S McGowan, PhD
Brian is a research scientist and educational technologist. He helped transform Pfizer’s Medical Education Group and previously served in educational leadership roles at HealthAnswers, Inc.; Acumentis, LLC.; Cephalon; and Wyeth. He taught graduate medical education programs at Arcadia University for 10 years. Dr. McGowan recently authored the book "#socialQI: Simple Solutions for Improving Your Healthcare" and has been invited to speak internationally on the subject of information flow, technology, and learning in healthcare.
