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1st
appeared 01 July 1999
Health Professions Accreditation System
"Obsolete," According to Task Force Report
Academic accreditation offers a public seal of approval -- a guarantee of quality in
higher education programs. However, traditional evaluation processes for accrediting
health professions programs are out of date with changes in the global health care and
higher educational environments and need to change, according to a report by a task force
directed by the UC San Francisco Center for the Health Professions.
The Task Force On Accreditation of Health Professions Education report recommends that
accrediting agencies be more responsive to the needs of students and the public, adopt a
uniform approach to accrediting all programs, and explore new technologies to streamline
accreditation.
"Accreditation today is at a crossroads -- caught between the 'old way' of doing
things and demands for a 'new way' of doing business," said Edward O' Neil, director
of the Center for the Health Professions, executive director of the Pew Health Commission,
and a member of the task force. "Students have a right to know that the programs they
enter will prepare them to be good physicians, nurses, dentists, or therapists. And
members of the public have a right to know that the people to whom they entrust their
health have the education they need to do their jobs well."
The accreditation process has become complex and inefficient, focussing more on rigid
compliance with arcane rules than on improving the quality of educational programs that
graduate new health professionals, according to the report.
Part of the problem with accreditation lies in the number of accrediting agencies,
according to the report. More than 50 accreditation programs evaluate higher education
programs for physicians, nurses, dentists, pharmacists, acupuncturists, and other health
professionals. All of them use different standards and reporting requirements, creating
more work for educational programs seeking accreditation and increasing the cost of
accreditation.
"In addition, the process itself is far from ideal," said O' Neil.
"Standards for accreditation are developed with little if any public input, teams of
site visitors are notoriously uneven in their evaluations, and considerable human,
physical, and financial resources are consumed by the accreditation process."
In the report, the task force identified four major issues in accreditation:
the need for a simplified process;
the development of, and transition to, a process
focused on improvement;
the creation of closer linkages between the
accreditation community and its stakeholders; and
the use of generic benchmarks or standards.
Links:
Full UCSF press release
Center for the Health Professions
Downloadable copy of report
Source: Lordelyn P. del Rosario,
News Services |
