FIMA Year Book 2009 - Federation of Islamic Medical Associations

Quality Assurancemay learn new strategies and methodsthat can be instrumental in improvingtheir faculty (10,22-25,29) .Annual reports of staff and studentsAcademic staff should have annualperformance appraisals of their work.Any deficiencies detected should thenbe rectified. Those contributing morein nurturing quality culture must beappropriately rewarded. Students’annual reports must come from theirmentors on a regular basis. A yearlyreport with critical analysis presentedand discussed in a faculty boardmeeting will lead to improved qualityof knowledge, skills and attitudes of thestudents (22) .Academic council and faculty boardRegular meetings of faculty boardsand academic councils with criticalreview of the educational reports ofongoing academic activities, reviewingexamination questions, and reviewingminutes of monthly departmentalmeetings and academic performance,including research done in a particularfaculty, is an important tool to assurequality.BenchmarkingThe curricula should not be designedand progressed in isolation. Ratherthe curricula in the faculty shouldbe compared with curricula in otherfaculties. This process has now becomeeasier because many universities puttheir curricula on their websites. Thepurpose of benchmarking is not tocopy other’s performance. It servesthe purpose of indicating whether,in general, we are ‘moving with thecrowd’. If a curriculum differs in majorways from comparable institutions, arational explanation must be found.Other approaches to benchmarkingcould be achieved by registeringstudents to take international medicalexaminations. In USA there is MCATand USMLE examinations. The MCATexamination is taken by pre-medicalstudents. The USMLE I examination istaken by students who have completedthe medical sciences curriculum. TheUSMLE II is taken at the end of clinicaltraining. GMC of UK has designedtheir own system of evaluation ofquality products. The same is done byother countries to assure quality intheir respective environments. Manycountries now stress on adequatelinguistic proficiency which is used asthe medium of educational process (23) .English has become an internationallanguage of scientific and professionalcommunication. Internet informationis predominantly in English. Thereforequality teaching and quality learningrequire mastery of the English language.Special courses of English proficiencyshould be conducted for students andacademic staff whenever it is requiredin the faculty or institution (24, 29) .Quality Assurance is an IslamicconceptIhsan (Excellence) in the Qur’anFourteen centuries ago, Islam enjoinedFIMA YearBook 2009166