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In this article, we provide a brief overview of the evaluation movement in continuing health professional education, beginning with Dixon's 1978 article on evaluation criteria and strategies. We define evaluation, discuss the forces driving the evaluation movement, and present the results of a search of the continuing education literature. Examples of program evaluations drawn from the literature illustrate Dixon's four types of evaluation, as well as some of the qualitative and quantitative tools used in evaluation, particularly the role of the randomized controlled trial. We conclude with a discussion of the evaluation movement's strengths and weaknesses, and its possible future directions.

At an annual continuing medical education (CME) event, the subject of the management of asthma in pregnancy was taught to attendees using a lecture format and, in consecutive years, a small group interactive teaching format was used. For both years of the study, knowledge retention was assessed by comparing multiple choice test scores on a pretest, a post-test, taken shortly after the educational intervention, and a follow-up test taken 3 months after the educational intervention. Scores showed a significant improvement following the lecture and small group teaching formats for the post-test and follow-up tests. Scores at the preteaching and post-teaching tests were similar for the lecture and small group teaching formats. The scores on the follow-up test, however, were slightly better for the lecture group compared with the small group teaching format, although the difference was small and not significant. We conclude, therefore, that in a CME setting the lecture format of teaching compared favorably with small group learning in terms of knowledge retention.

CME providers often have information needs that are not readily met by commercial indexing services. To help address this problem, continuing education staff in the medical faculties of McMaster University and the University of Toronto have developed the Research and Development Resource Base in Continuing Medical Education (RDRB/CME). This bibliographic database collects in one place many of the references to the literature of continuing health professional education. A librarian at the University of Toronto offers a low cost literature search service to physicians, educators, administrators, and other health professionals.