What is MELD?
Introduction
MELD, the MedBiquitous E-Learning Discourse, is an online community of practice that invites a diverse set of professionals involved in healthcare education to solve real-world problems in the delivery and development of healthcare education by sharing knowledge and developing best practices.
MELD is an online publication of the MedBiquitous Consortium and Laboratory. Founded by Johns Hopkins Medicine and leading professional medical societies, MedBiquitous is an international group of professional medical associations, universities, commercial, and governmental organizations dedicated to advancing medical education through technology standards that promote professional competence, collaboration, and better patient care. Our society members represent over 400,000 physicians worldwide, and our government and industry members are leaders in healthcare. The MedBiquitous Consortium is an American National Standards Institute (ANSI) accredited standards development organization.
Background
As a consequence of the tremendous demand for online healthcare education for all levels of learners, there has been a rapid response by a diverse set of professionals from a wide array of institutions to meet this need. Educators ranging from medical practitioners to instructional designers try to adapt old methods to the new media. Strategic planners, including administrators and executives from teaching hospitals, pharmaceutical corporations, medical societies, medical boards, and scientific publishers, struggle to create strategic plans for their institutions.
Outside of healthcare, education professionals, including instructional designers, are developing guidelines and best practices for online education. Information technology companies are developing platforms for the delivery and development of online education. In addition, standards organizations are working to develop technology standards to ensure that online education developed for one software platform can be delivered on a variety of platforms and reused in different contexts.
This energetic response has led to a wealth of knowledge and expertise both inside and outside of medicine. Some of this knowledge has been formalized in sources such as websites, professional journals, books, and coursework. Some remains with individuals or institutions and is tacit, undocumented, and informal. Despite this wealth of expertise and information, there is no comprehensive resource where people involved in medical education can go to familiarize themselves with current e-learning theory, best practices, standards, technology, and issues specific to medical e-learning. Nor is there a place where diverse professionals—from newcomer to expert—can learn from each other, collaborate, and innovate. As a consequence, efforts to create quality online learning for healthcare professionals at all levels remain fragmented and ineffective.
Vision
MELD will improve patient care throughout the world by advancing healthcare learning online. It will do this by creating the only comprehensive resource that serves people involved in producing and distributing online healthcare education for all levels of learners. This online community of practice will provide information and collaborative opportunities on a range of topics in e-learning including pedagogy (i.e., instructional design, assessment, distance learning, and curriculum development), technology standards, educational technology, educational metrics, e-learning economics, and issues and methods specific to healthcare education. The site will become known as the best place to turn to become familiar with key issues, existing resources, and best practices for these endeavors.
This community will provide information and collaborative opportunities to a diverse set of individuals involved in healthcare e-learning and will draw readers and participants from the following professions:
- Instructional Designers
- Medical educators including physicians
- Standards developers
- Executives
- Administrators
- IT staff including software developers and system administrators
It is also envisioned that the community will draw participants from a wide range of institutions, including:
- Medical schools
- Teaching hospitals
- Medical professional societies
- Medical boards
- Pharmaceutical and medical device companies
- Scientific publishers
- Educational technology companies
- Standards groups
