What is a practice improvement activity, and how often must one be completed?

What is a practice improvement activity, and how often must one be completed?

Twice per 10-year cycle, you must complete an activity designed to evaluate the delivery of health care in your practice. The first activity must be accomplished within years 1 through 5 and the second activity within years 6 through 10 in order to be "participating in continuing certification".

The breadth of ways in which this requirement can be completed include using registries, patient logs, patient surveys, peer surveys, practice improvement modules, performance improvement CME activities, etc. The ABD offers simplified and streamlined tools to fulfill this requirement in a library with more than 40 Focused Practice Improvement (FPI) activities. Completing an exercise from the ABD's FPI library automatically updates your continuing certification table's Practice Improvement requirement box and adds 25 self-assessment (SA) credits within your current SA segment. 

For additional information about traditional practice assessment/quality improvement activities, refer to QI Fundamentals - the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) Cycle. 

Dermatopathologists not engaged in patient care may be able to use a program developed by the American Society of Dermatopathology (ASDP). The ASDP has 3 self-assessment exercises, one that is online and two others that are presented at their annual meeting, as well as a Practice Assessment exercise that is presented at their annual meeting. We will work with Diplomates who primarily are engaged in regulatory or other functions to design programs meaningful to their spheres of expertise.