Preparing physicians for the complex challenges of tomorrow must begin today. This is the impetus for the AMA’s newly launched precision education grant program, Transforming Lifelong Learning Through Precision Education. This program seeks to incorporate the most effective and equitable models of personalized education and training into medical schools and residency programs while also supporting lifelong learning for physicians.
The application process to receive one of 10, four-year, $1.1 million precision education grants is open now. Letters of intent will be accepted through April 21 from U.S.-based programs that serve medical students, residents, fellows and practicing physicians. Because developing an ideal precision education system will most likely demand cooperation and collaboration across disciplines, multi-institutional projects are just as welcome to apply as single organizations.
Selected applicants will be invited by May 28 to tender detailed proposals, which will be due July 23. You can find complete details on eligibility, key application elements, the full program timetable and a list of FAQs here.
Revolutionizing medical education
Reimagining medical education, training and lifelong learning has been a strategic priority for the AMA for more than a decade. As part of our work with what is now known as the ChangeMedEd® initiative, the AMA began the effort to reinvent medical education in 2013, recognizing that the old model that had trained me and so many other physicians had become outdated in the complex health environment we see today.
Some aspiring young physicians were graduating from medical school without hands-on experience with the latest digital tools that would define this era in medicine. And too often, they were launching their careers without much understanding of how to function effectively in the highly specialized modern health care system.
Health care had evolved—dramatically. And the way we were educating physicians needed to evolve as well to prepare them for the new realities they would face once they were practicing in today’s health systems. We needed to reimagine medical education to ensure the best for physicians, for their patients and for our overall health care system.
Over the past decade we have responded by awarding nearly $40 million in grants to leading medical schools and graduate medical education programs to promote innovation and ensure that physicians have the proper educational foundation and training required to thrive in 21st century medicine. One of our first efforts, the Accelerating Change in Medical Education Consortium, drew together 37 leading medical schools in two dozen states with a focus on competency-based approaches, health systems science, utilizing technology for learning, and academic coaching.
We followed up with our Reimagining Residency initiative to transform residency training to best address the workplace needs of our current and future health care system. Now in its sixth and final year, Reimagining Residency supports bold and innovative projects that provide a meaningful and safe transition from medical school to residency, and establish new curricular content and experiences to enhance readiness for practice and promote well-being in training.
The next phase of our work focuses on precision education, which in the most basic terms strives to provide the right training to the right physician at the right time through seamless, personalized learning tailored to the specific characteristics of the individual learner. Precision education supports lifelong learning to align physician education with the needs of patients and the community both now and in the future.
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Taking the next step
Our previous efforts with the ChangeMedEd initiative laid the groundwork for our current effort to promote precision education and our other areas of educational focus, which include:
- Competency-based medical education.
- Transitions across the continuum.
- Equity, diversity and belonging.
The grant program I mentioned above is a $12 million investment in the future of medical education and training that will provide patients with better outcomes through a physician workforce that embraces the master adaptive learner mindset. This effort, like its predecessors, will help traditional medical education evolve by leveraging augmented intelligence, data systems and the full spectrum of evolving technology to personalize training, optimize learning and transfer agency to the learner.
Commitment to precision education
Precision education is the future of medical education and the very foundation of precision medicine. The 10 projects selected to receive at least $1.1 million each over four years through this new grant program will broaden access to this innovative and transformative approach that will elevate the competencies that matter most in patient care today and in the years ahead.
In addition, this new initiative aligns well with programs already underway across the AMA through our online learning hub (AMA Ed Hub™), our JAMA Network®, our Silicon Valley business development enterprise (Health 2047), and our ongoing work in evaluating and adopting digital health technologies. All of this work promotes lifelong learning for every stage of a physician’s career.
The AMA is proud to serve as the physician’s powerful ally in patient care. We are equally proud to support the democratization of the precision education ecosystem to ensure patients receive the best care possible now and in the future.
