Shaping the Future of Holistic Hidradenitis Suppurativa Care: The Power of Multimodal Continuing Medical Education

Abstract

Introduction: Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) profoundly impacts patients’ physical and psychosocial well-being. Combining approved therapies with surgical interventions in clinical practice is critical to effective, long-term management, and all members of the HS care team (advanced practitioners [APs] and physicians) should be well-equipped to provide optimal care for patients. To meet this educational need, CMEsquared^® partnered with the HS Foundation to develop a multimodal, educational initiative focused on holistic HS management.

Methods: Two 90-minute, in-person CME workshops on HS were delivered at the 2024 Winter Clinical Miami Dermatology Conference^® and 2024 Fall Clinical Dermatology Conference^® for PAs & NPs, with a video recording endured on Dermsquared.org until July 2025. The workshops were led by a multidisciplinary expert panel that included physicians, a physician assistant, and a patient advocate with lived experience of HS. A variety of learning methods were used to maximize educational impact; these included: 1) didactic lecture on HS diagnosis and guidelines, clinical data for approved/emerging therapies, in-office surgical procedures, wound care and pain management, and patient perspectives, 2) pre-recorded video demonstration of surgical procedures (punch deroofing and deroofing for persistent nodules, plaques and tunnels), and 3) hands-on, simulation workshop on surgical procedures using food models of HS nodules and tunnels in the skin. Aggregate data on clinician perspectives and paired pre-/post-test questions across both live workshops and the endured activity were evaluated.

Results: Through the 978 clinician learners (42% APs, 58% physicians), the education will impact 1,698 patients with HS/week and 88,296 patients with HS/year. More than half of learners were early-career clinicians (≤10 years). Over 95% of clinicians agreed that the teaching style was appropriate, and that content was relevant to practice. The education strongly impacted intent to change practice (APs, 88%; physicians, 84%); both groups ranked “treatment,” “diagnosis,” and “use of new medications” among their top 5 intended changes. There were observed improvements in knowledge on therapeutic mechanism of action (relative increase: APs, 40%; physicians, 16%) and competence in therapeutic selection (relative increase: APs, 5%; physicians, 10%).

Conclusion: HS education that incorporated didactic instruction, tactile skill-building, and patient insights enhanced understanding of holistic HS management among members of the dermatology care team, especially for clinicians early in their careers. It also stimulated consideration of meaningful practice changes. This multimodal educational method could be applied to other therapeutic areas, where appropriate, to equip clinicians with the knowledge and skills needed to improve patient outcomes.