Designing an evaluation framework for WFME basic standards for medical education.
OBJECTIVE
To create an evaluation plan for the World Federation for Medical Education (WFME) accreditation standards for basic medical education.


METHODS
We conceptualized the 100 basic standards from "Basic Medical Education: WFME Global Standards for Quality Improvement: The 2012 Revision" as medical education program objectives. Standards were simplified into evaluable items, which were then categorized as inputs, processes, outputs and/or outcomes to generate a logic model and corresponding plan for data collection.


RESULTS
WFME standards posed significant challenges to evaluation due to complex wording, inconsistent formatting and lack of existing assessment tools. Our resulting logic model contained 244 items. Standard B 5.1.1 separated into 24 items, the most for any single standard. A large proportion of items (40%) required evaluation of more than one input, process, output and/or outcome. Only one standard (B 3.2.2) was interpreted as requiring evaluation of a program outcome.


CONCLUSIONS
Current WFME standards are difficult to use for evaluation planning. Our analysis may guide adaptation and revision of standards to make them more evaluable. Our logic model and data collection plan may be useful to medical schools planning an institutional self-review and to accrediting authorities wanting to provide guidance to schools under their purview.
a Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine , USA .
Sean
S
Tackett
b The Centre for Medical Education in Context (CenMEDIC) , UK .
Janet
J
Grant
c Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health , USA.
Kristin
K
Mmari
D000068:Accreditation / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D003479:Curriculum / Q000592:standards; D003625:Data Collection; D004501:Education, Medical / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D038622:Internationality; D011786:Quality Control; D012577:Schools, Medical / Q000592:standards*