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CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION TRAINING COURSES

Despite many millions of dollars spent on continuing education programs, including CME, most research has shown that typical continuing education programs are not effective.  At the REACH Institute, we agree with this finding as it applies to most continuing education programs, which are "hit-and-run" trainings, rather than the type training that is needed, such as REACH's hands-on, sustained "mini-fellowship" in topics of interest, such as our 6-month-long mini-fellowship in Primary Pediatric Psychopharmacology Program (PPP).  REACH's PPP fellowships are intended for pediatricians, family physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistants -- essentially any licensed healthcare provider who wants to learn more about, or even master pediatric psychopharmacology.

REACH's PPP fellowship in child psychopharmacology is in fact a sustained mentoring, coaching, and skill development program. Thus, while most CME programs appear to be largely ineffective, do not confuse what you have experienced as the "typical" CME and other continuing education programs with the type of training in child psychopharmacology offered by the REACH Institute.  All of our continuing education programs use evidence-based teaching methods, and are guided by basic behavior science-proven change methods.  There are not your grandmother's CME programs!  All of the REACH's Institute training courses are distinguished by 7 characteristics:

1. Multi-disorder & Evidence-based: Children almost always present with a combination of problems. And so REACH provides state of the art training programs in evidence-based interventions for children with some combination of disruptive behaviors, anxiety, depression, and trauma. Training for a given problem is always integrated with training for other problems. Procedures and therapeutic techniques are applied consistently across problem areas. While we have found that multi-disorder training is usually more useful and less costly than single disorder training, there are cases when the latter is preferable. For such cases, our training is also well suited.

2. Distinguished faculty lead workshops and coaching sessions. Our faculty is distinguished by its seniority, breadth of expertise and level of involvement. All are graduate level professors with deep mentoring experience. All teach the leading edge evidence-based treatment programs that they themselves have developed, usually supported by NIH funding. REACH faculty include leading experts in each of the key pediatric psychopharmacology problem areas. Faculty lead not only the workshops but on-going coaching sessions which take place every other week for six months to a year.

3. Customized. Before REACH delivers any continuing education or CME training, we conduct a needs assessment. Training courses are then tailored to the unique skill levels, capacities, and criteria of our clients For example, clients with a background in child psychopharmacology may skip to more advanced training. Subject areas can be dropped or added, topics emphasized or not. Training can be tailored in this way because our faculty has the necessary sophistication and expertise. We need not use the highly prescriptive, packaged approach common to most training.

4. Outcomes Oriented: Training focuses on skill development, hands-on practice, and role-playing. The goal is to help primary care providers change their clinical practice procedures and improve their patients’ outcomes, which is why on-going case-based coaching plays such an important role in REACH training.

5. Transportable: Once key members of your organization's leadership team have been effectively trained, REACH teaches them how to train new primary care clinicians within your organization.

6. Integrated training materials: Training manuals and materials have been designed by our faculty, based on their carefully research treatment programs and decades of experience, specifically for you. All manuals and materials are carefully integrated, available online, and constantly updated to reflect your needs and input. Easy to understand handouts for patients and families are integrated into all of your assessment, diagnostic, and treatment approaches.

7. State of Art Online and Distance Learning Methods. Similarly, all of our continuing education training programs make extensive use of rating scales to help clinicians conduct a thorough assessment by offering manyuser-friendly toolkits and free materials on our website.  We take full advantage of the new technologies available through distance learning and online training methods, such as webinars, chat rooms, and listservs.

LEARNING ABOUT REACH'S TREATMENT TRAINING COURSES

To learn more about the REACH Institute's training courses, including our continuing education and continuing medical education (CME) courses in state-of-art child psychopharmacology treatments for ADHD, depression, anxiety disorders, conduct and oppositional-defiant disorders, bipolar disorder, autism and autism spectrum disorders, please click on our Continuing Education and CME programs link. All of our CME and continuing education training programs make extensive use of rating scales to help clinicians conduct a thorough assessment by offering many user-friendly toolkits and free materials on our website.

There you will find information on continuing education and CME programs in how to deliver cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for all major childhood mental health disorders, parent training programs for teaching behavior therapy procedures and principles to parents, collaborative problem solving (CPS) therapies based on Ross Greene's work, and trauma-focused CBT training programs based on Judy Cohen and Tony Mannarino's research. All of the major forms of child psychotherapy proven to work with children and teens are available here.

Delivering safe and appropriate pharmacotherapy - medication prescribing - regardless of whether you are a nurse practitioner, pediatrician, work in family practice, are a physician's assistant, a pediatric neurologist, psychiatrist, or child and adolescent psychiatrist, and whether you are just beginning pediatric pharmacology or are eager to learn advanced skills in child pharmacology and medication prescribing, the CME and continuing education training courses provided by the REACH Institute cover stimulants, mood stabilizers, SSRIs, and antipsychotics, and even more importantly, what needs to be done before you pull your prescription pad!

Given REACH's non-profit status and our growing donor base, free or low-cost CME and continuing educationmay also be available.  Please inquire if you think you, your practice, or your healthcare organization might qualify.