Faculties of medicine respond to opioid crisis with new CME and medical school curricula

Physicians can now take an accredited online CME course on substance use disorders and pain management. The curriculum was designed by the Association of Faculties of Medicine in Canada (AFMC) in response to the opioid crisis.Working with experts and patients, AFMC developed three competency-based programs for different audiences:undergraduate medical students or IMGs (available in Dec. 2023)post-graduate medical students (available in Jan. 2024)continuing professional development (available in March 2024)AFMC shared the bilingual curriculum with all 17 medical schools in Canada and a free version is available on the AFMC website. Physicians can also pay $399 to take the accredited course and obtain continuing education credits. Family physicians who take the course get College of Family Physicians of Canada’s Mainpro+ credits and Royal College of Physicians and Surgeon specialists would earn section three self-assessment credits through its Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program.The continuing professional development curriculum (also called advanced practice) includes topics such as:Injectable opioid agonist treatmentPhysician liabilityChronic painWomen’s health, pediatrics, emergency medicine and psychiatryIt includes eight topic areas, and each topic area takes 50 to 80 minutes to complete.A free self-assessment tool will help physicians determine what parts of the curriculum they need to take.“They don’t have to go through all the modules, they can really curate what meets their needs best and use their time most effectively,” explained Dr. Lisa Graves, the project lead for the AFMC’s Response to the Opioid Crisis project, in a AFMC video.The postgraduate medical student curriculum (also called intermediate practice) will include topics such as:building relationshipsopioid stewardship, including prescribing and deprescribingmanagement of chronic pain and cancer-related painadvanced knowledge of pain managementmedical addiction treatmentThe undergraduate medical education curriculum (also called foundational practice) includes a focus on:public health perspective of the opioid crisiscore concepts in pain and pain managementpharmacology of opioidsopioid stewardship, including in palliative carediagnosis and management of opioid use disorderscultural considerations and legal obligationsIt includes 10 modules. “I really hope that by helping to explain the way people are experiencing their substance use, experiencing their withdrawal, experiencing treatment, that all clinicians will be able to provide more appropriate care,” said Dr. Jennifer Wyman, medical director of the substance use service of Women’s College Hospital and assistant professor at the University of Toronto in a video by AFMC. “It doesn’t mean that every physician is going to become an expert in addiction medicine or be expected to be able to deliver full therapy, but to understand where the resources are and how to offer patient-centred and trauma-informed care.”More information is available at the AFMC website.

Faculties of medicine respond to opioid crisis with new CME and medical school curricula

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