Tracking Medical Education
The medical education that physicians receive is an important factor in the quality of health care. Before we can begin the task of improving medical education, we must first understand the world's medical education systems as they exist today. The collection of accurate data on medical education worldwide is key to achieving such an understanding.
The Foundation's Data Resources Center strives to be the single best source of information on international medical education and international medical graduates. To accomplish this, it constructs data repositories that contain information on medical education and physicians worldwide. The goal is for these repositories to contain both current and historical information and for them to be freely and easily accessible to medical educators, researchers, policy makers, and organizations concerned with credentialing and licensure. They are also intended to be an important resource for health care consumers and prospective medical school students.
Currently, FAIMER offers:
- International Medical Education Directory - a directory that provides basic and curricular information on the world's medical schools.
- Directory of Organizations that Recognize Medical Schools - a directory of the organizations that are typically responsible for the establishment of national standards for medical education and the recognition of medical schools in their countries.
FAIMER is also developing the Postgraduate Medical Education Directory, which will provide data, by country, on medical education and clinical training, beyond the basic medical school curriculum.
Taken together, these complementary resources will provide a comprehensive picture of the world's medical education systems, from undergraduate medical education through specialty certification, which is necessary to begin improving world health by improving medical education.
