Medical School Accreditation in Libya: Current Trends and Future Challenges.

Abstract

Medical school education plays a significant role in the advancement of any country. The recent global progressions and changes in medical education will create a great burden on the third world countries, including Libya. In order to measure the quality educational systems, it is relevant to establish a functional system that recognizes and measure the essential abilities to meet quality service needs in communities as well as apply principles of emerging basics for quality medical practice locally and internationally. Since its establishment in 2006 to the present, the national center for quality assurance and accreditation in Libya NCQAA has accomplished its command as the sole accreditation council for the all existing medical schools in Libya. With prospective vision, the NCQAA’s role will be to further encourage all medical schools in Libya towards the nonstop improvement to meet the international standards. Furthermore, the 2015 revision of the World Federation for Medical Education (WFME) requires that all medical schools meet the new accreditation standards by 2023. Hence, the next step for NCQAA is to audit the progress and increase the standard of medical education in individual schools, with the eventual goal of reaching superior standard of medical education for all schools in Libya. This commentary describes the current trends in Libyan medical education accreditation and how this concern has inspired the Libyan authorities to take action in this regard.