Editorial CME Congress, Simulation Technology, and the Relationship Between Means and Ends CURTIS A. OLSON,PHD Although use of simulation-based continuing education (SBCE) for health professionals has been increasing, it lags behind undergraduate and graduate education, where the trend over the past decade has been one of rapid growth. 1 The noteworthy exceptions are the specialties of anesthesi- ology, surgery, and emergency medicine, which continue to provide leadership in the use of simulation for continuing education of both individuals and teams. There are, however, encouraging signs that the use of simulation technology in the CE domain is accelerating. Simulation was, for exam- ple, a major theme at CME Congress 2012, held in Toronto this spring. Also, JCEHP’s editorial office is seeing more manuscript submissions on the topic. So I was pleased to be approached by Dr Paul Mazmanian, the immediate past editor of JCEHP, about the journal’s interest in publishing a suite of articles on simulation and human factors written by several experts in the area. The outcome of his inquiry is this special focus issue. The seven articles in the Special Focus section on simula- tion are what might be called bridging or boundary-spanning works. They are written by authors whose names will be un- familiar to many of JCEHP’s readers and who consider their primary discipline something other than continuing profes- sional development (CPD). These authors, with Dr. Mazma- nian’s guidance, have ventured into the space between their respective fields of expertise and continuing education to Disclosures: The author reports none. Dr. Olson: Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Continuing Education in the Health Professions. Correspondence: Curtis A. Olson, University of Wisconsin-Madison Of- fice of Continuing Professional Development in Medicine and Public Health, 2701 International Lane, Suite 208, Madison, WI 53704; e-mail: Caolson2@wisc.edu. C  2012 The Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions, the Society for Academic Continuing Medical Education, and the Council on Continuing Medical Education, Association for Hospital Medical Education.  Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com). DOI: 10.1002/chp.21149 address the challenging task of inserting into continuing ed- ucation in the health professions (CEHP) discourse a wealth of highly relevant concepts, evidence, and practices from a body of theoretical and empirical literature that resides largely outside the CPD literature. Like many others who have found themselves on the lead- ing edge of a promising and rapidly developing area of re- search and practice, investigators working on advancing and applying simulation technology show great enthusiasm about its potential, even as they maintain their detached, skeptical stance as scientists. Their excitement is understandable given the technological and theoretical advances that are adding depth and realism to simulations, the growing body of re- search on the effectiveness of simulation as an educational method, and the substantial investments that academic med- ical centers are making in technical and human resources for simulation. As we learn more about what SBCE entails, become ex- posed to the range of innovative approaches being tested, and enhance our proficiency in using simulation technology, we also need to maintain a critically reflective mindset as a means of locating simulation within the CEHP space and developing a fuller appreciation of its power and potential, on the one hand, and limitations on the other. For if there is any conclusion that can be reached from the corpus of re- search on effectiveness of CPD, it is that there are no “magic bullets,” no single method or combination of methods that are effective in every situation. In the absence of compelling evidence to the contrary, I assume that the same dictum ap- plies to the technologies and instructional tools that comprise simulation. To illustrate the point, consider the following sequence of events that took place in a plenary session at this year’s CME Congress. Dr Amatai Ziv, founder and director of the Israel Center for Medical Simulation, provided an intriguing description of how simulation technology is being used at his center and elsewhere and his perspective on where simulation in health care is going. Dr Ziv is a strong and articulate advocate, as JOURNAL OF CONTINUING EDUCATION IN THE HEALTH PROFESSIONS,32(4):227–229, 2012