‘PMC working for WFME accreditation’

Islamabad : The Pakistan Medical Commission is striving to improve the quality of medical education and practice in the country as suggested by the World Federation for Medical Education for recognition worldwide, PMC president Prof Noshad Ahmad Shaikh said.

He was addressing the first meeting of the WFME Accreditation Task Force held at the PMC, where PMC vice-president Dr Khurshid Ahmad Nasim and special advisers Dr Raheela Yasmin, Dr Ali Tayyab and Dr Umar Ali Khan were also in attendance. The PMC president said after the PMC qualified for the WFME accreditation lately, the task force was formed to work on the steps required for the purpose.

He said the task force had to expedite the finalisation of the accreditation application to be submitted to the WFME. As the deadline by Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates had been fixed as 2024 and the future of Pakistani graduates was at stake, the accreditation process should be undertaken as a priority.

A presentation regarding the current status of the accreditation and an overview of the WFME accreditation timeline was given by the task force to chalk out further implementation of the process. The PMC president informed the committee that the council had decided that 2022 accreditation standards shall be a vision document. The current inspection criteria are the 2019 standards based on which the PMC may perform inspections.

He said the PMC Council was focusing to complete the mandatory requirements and develop the standards of the medical and dental profession as per not only the WFME standards but also international best practices.

The participants agreed that the PMC website would hall be upgraded to help address students’ issues. The PMC president also met Aga Khan University Karachi's top bosses about the WFME accreditation task force and said doctors and graduates did not need to worry as the PMC was making efforts to get the accreditation and soon will achieve the goal.