Incremental quality model: status of medical schools in Mexico

Abstract

Introduction: During postmodernism, healthcare environment is facing changes in technology, epidemiology and social habits. Medical schools aim to ensure quality standards to educate graduates who can face these increasingly accelerated transitions. 

Objective: To propose a quality model with incremental stages useful to rank medical schools in Mexico, in order to identify priorities to achieve the vision to sustainably impact on healthcare systems.

Method: The method applied was qualitative and descriptive. The first phase was the design of the incremental quality model in five levels: initiation, development, standardization, innovation and sustainability. On a second part, the stages were validated from a group of experts (12 executives from medical schools). They decided a method to classify the institutions on the incremental quality model stages considering their official quality evidences: regulations, affiliations, accreditations and quality awards. As a final step, a document analysis was performed to rank medical schools in Mexico according to the previously authorized incremental quality model.

Results: The model was approved by the experts. From official documents it was found that 42.8% of medical schools in Mexico have demonstrated the level of standardization, but none of them have demonstrated the levels of innovation or sustainability.

Conclusions: The stages of the model and the analysis presented here is an initial step for medical schools in Mexico to prioritize the challenges of the environment. Some actions to encourage institutions to evolve to higher levels of performance are proposed.