Medical Education Collaboration and Medical Education Research Center, Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, 050017, China.
Foreign Language Education Department, Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, 050017, China.
BMC Med Educ. 2022 May 31;22(1):414. doi: 10.1186/s12909-022-03491-8.
Medical education accreditation in China has been conducted by the Working Committee for the Accreditation of Medical Education (WCAME) and 129 medical schools have completed accreditation by December 2021. Despite studies on the standards, process and effectiveness of accreditation, the actual information transparency of accredited medical schools in China has not been examined. The study investigated the status of publicly available information from WCAME-accredited medical schools in China, and whether public availability of information had significant differences among different types of universities.
The 129 medical schools' official websites were reviewed for the 21 criteria of the WFME Global Standards for Quality Improvement: Basic Medical Education. Dichotomous method was used to record information as presence or absence. SPSS was utilized for descriptive and ANOVA analyses.
The mean of the publicly available information on the 21 criteria was 13.77 ± 3.57, and only 5 (3.9%) accredited medical schools had all relevant information available. Publicly available information on Governance (100%) and Administration (100%) was the most, whereas information on Assessment in support of learning (16.3%) was the least. Public availability of information differed significantly among schools accredited with higher (18.15 ± 2.16), medium (13.69 ± 3.41) and lower results (12.79 ± 3.19) (F = 14.71, p < 0.05). Medical universities and comprehensive universities did not show significant differences in their overall information availability (F = 0.25, p > 0.05). Central government funded universities had a remarkably larger amount of publicly available information than local government funded universities (17.86 ± 1.98 vs. 12.75 ± 2.93, p < 0.05).
Public availability of information from the accredited medical schools in China needs to be improved to promote transparency and continuous quality improvement, especially with regard to information on curriculum, assessment and quality assurance. Explicit information availability requirements need to be considered to include in medical education standards, and further studies are warranted to explore which information elements should be made publicly available.
中国的医学教育认证由医学教育认证工作委员会（WCAME）负责，截至 2021 年 12 月，已有 129 所医学院校完成认证。尽管已经对认证的标准、过程和效果进行了研究，但中国认证医学院校的实际信息透明度尚未得到检验。本研究调查了中国 WCAME 认证医学院校公开信息的现状，以及信息的公开程度在不同类型高校之间是否存在显著差异。
对 129 所医学院校的官方网站进行了审查，以了解世界医学教育联合会全球基本医学教育质量改进标准的 21 项标准。采用二项式方法记录信息的有无。使用 SPSS 进行描述性和方差分析。
21 项标准中公开信息的平均值为 13.77±3.57，仅有 5 所（3.9%）认证医学院校提供了所有相关信息。在治理（100%）和管理（100%）方面的公开信息最多，而在支持学习的评估方面（16.3%）的信息最少。在认证成绩较高（18.15±2.16）、中等（13.69±3.41）和较低（12.79±3.19）的学校之间，信息的公开程度存在显著差异（F=14.71，p<0.05）。医学大学和综合性大学在整体信息公开程度上没有显著差异（F=0.25，p>0.05）。中央政府资助的大学公开的信息量明显大于地方政府资助的大学（17.86±1.98 比 12.75±2.93，p<0.05）。
中国认证医学院校公开信息的程度有待提高，以提高透明度和持续质量改进，特别是在课程、评估和质量保证方面的信息。需要考虑明确的信息公开要求，将其纳入医学教育标准，并进一步研究应公开哪些信息要素。
