May saw the launch of BMJ Portfolio. This is actually something of a radical new step for BMJ Group – the first website we’ve launched with no content. Instead, it’s a tool doctors can use for recording their own needs, activities and notes relating to keeping up to date with medicine – continual professional development, or CPD, as it’s known. Why would doctors use BMJ Portfolio rather than the back of an envelope or an Excel spreadsheet?

There are lots of reasons:

• It integrates with our online products, so if you take an online module in BMJ Learning, it’s added automatically – Best Practice is integrated too, and BMJ.com and all our journals are soon going to have an “add to portfolio” button.
• It lets users tag their notes with keywords for rapid search and retrieval. Doctors can group their activities by formal accreditation criteria, clinical area, activity, or any way they like.
• In the future, doctors will be able to compare notes, share the resources they’ve found most useful, and use the tool collaboratively to improve their professional development.

The user interface is more advanced than on any other site we have, and we’ve copied the approaches used by sites like Gmail, Facebook and iTunes to let users configure the way Portfolio works and looks for themselves.

And it’s free. Anyone can create a BMJ Learning account to use it (doing this will also allow you to view all the free learning modules on learning.bmj.com).

We’d love feedback – email customerservice.learning@bmjgroup.com with the title portfolio suggestions. Thanks!

For more information:

User guide for BMJ Portfolio >>
Introductory video to BMJ Portfolio >>

http://portfolio.bmj.com

Jonathan Peterson, Head of Development and Operations, BMJ Technology and Helen Morant, Editor, Online Learning