Healthc Inform Res.  2013 Sep;19(3):154-161. 10.4258/hir.2013.19.3.154.

IMIA Accreditation of Health Informatics Programs

• Hasman A
• Mantas J

• KMID: 2166693
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.4258/hir.2013.19.3.154

Abstract

OBJECTIVES
Health informatics programs usually are evaluated by national accreditation committees. Not always are the members of these committees well informed about the international level of (education in) health informatics. Therefore, when a program is accredited by a national accreditation committee, this does not always mean that the program is of an international level. The International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) has expertise in the field of education. The IMIA Recommendations on Education in Biomedical and Health Informatics guide curricula development. The goal of this article is to show that IMIA can also play the role of accreditation agency and to present the IMIA accreditation protocol and experiences obtained with it.
METHODS
The accreditation procedure used in the Netherlands and Belgium was taken as a template for the design of the IMIA accreditation protocol. In a trial period of one and a half year the protocol is tested out on six health informatics programs.
RESULTS
An accreditation protocol was designed. For judging the curriculum of a program the IMIA Recommendations are used. The institution has to write a self-assessment report and a site visit committee visits the program and judges its quality, supported by the self-assessment report and discussions with all stakeholders of the program.
CONCLUSIONS
After having visited three programs it appears that the IMIA accreditation procedure works well. Only a few changes had to be introduced. Writing the self-assessment report already appears to be beneficial for the management of the program to obtain a better insight in the quality of their program.

Keyword

Accreditation; Education; Medical Informatics; International Medical Informatics Association; Quality Assurance

MeSH Terms

Accreditation
Belgium
Curriculum
Informatics
Medical Informatics
Netherlands
Self-Assessment
Writing

Figure

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  Figure 1 Example of the part of the checklist concerning the subject: goals of the program.

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