During a session led by members of the Pharmaceutical Alliance
for CME at the Alliance for CME 2007 Annual Conference,
providers had the opportunity to grill their pharmaceutical
industry partners on anything and everything on their minds.
First up was the question of whether the pharmaceutical industry
would ever create a standardized grant request form. “No.
There's no hope of that,” said one pharma representative. “We
all have different emphases, different lawyers, and different
interpretations. Sorry.” Another added that there could be
antitrust issues involved. Mike Saxton, Med, FACME, senior
director, team leader, Medical Education Group, Pfizer, New
York, did offer a ray of hope, saying that companies might allow
providers to upload their own grant request proposals in the
future, so that they wouldn't have to complete each company's
form.  Outcomes Options  One CME provider wanted to know if,
with all the emphasis on measuring outcomes, providers might be
burning out their physician learners. But anot