Online learning resources based on the best available evidence

Online textbooks, e-conferences and telemedicine. Cyberpatients and virtual doctors. Lots of learning is available on the web, but much of it is flawed, indecipherable, and biased. Much of it uses new technologies for their own sake rather than as an aid to learning. Drug companies sponsor many of these learning initiatives. But in the United Kingdom the Department of Health has a programme to improve the experience of patients. Providing patients with choice is a key objective of the programme. And it is likely that patients would choose for their doctors to learn from independent sources.

Against this background the BMJ is launching bmjlearning.com–a service initially for general practitioners. Since the last editorial on BMJ Learning in January of this year, we have constructed learning resources based on the best available evidence so that doctors will be better equipped to improve quality of care.1 If they can record their learning experiences systematically they should feel more confident about appraisal. Appraisal has been in place for general practitioners for just over six months. There are concerns that it …