Second Meeting of the Advisory Committee
October 1-2, 2001

New York City


The second meeting of the Advisory Committee of the Institute for International Medical Education was convened on October 1-2, 2001 in New York under the Chairmanship of Dr. M. Roy Schwarz.  After welcoming remarks, the members of the Advisory Committee reported on the activities of their respective organizations.  Upon conclusion, Dr. Wojtczak presented a Progress Report summarizing the activities of the IIME during the past year.  He stressed that the "Global Minimum Essential Requirements ("GMER") document, developed through the expertise of the Core Committee, was completed one year earlier than originally planned.  He also indicated that the "Glossary of Medical Education Terms" has been updated to include most of the terms used in IIME documents.

Dr. Marvin Dunn, Chairman of the Core Committee, presented an outline of the "GMER" document that includes the essential competencies graduates should acquire during undergraduate medical education.  The "GMER" has 7 domains and 60 learning objectives, and is focused on essential or core competencies of global physicians.  "GMER" implies common minimum learning outcomes and recognizes that in addition to universal "global essentials", there are specific local issues that physicians must respond to which should be included in schools' educational programs.  It was emphasized that ownership of this document belongs to members of the Core Committee, and not to the IIME nor CMB.  The followup discussion conveyed the general consensus that the "GMER" document was comprehensive and well thought-out with the potential for very deep implications for medical education worldwide.  The members of the Advisory Committee felt it should be published, translated to other languages, and disseminated to the medical academic community as soon as possible.

Dr. David Stern reported on the first meeting of the "Task Force for Assessment", whose overall goal is to develop a set of methods to be used in the assessment of each learning outcome identified in the "GMER" document.

During the first meeting, over 75 different potential assessment tools were identified;  each "GMER" domain was reviewed, and the assessment tool(s) felt to be most appropriate were listed.  The Task Force also developed a set of principles of evaluation.  It is anticipated that a particular school may choose the evaluation method however, they must cover all required domains and competencies.  Although the project involves the evaluation of students, the intention is to use the aggregation of student data to evaluate the relative strengths and weaknesses of the educational experiences of a given school.  The plan is to begin the Implementation Phase of the project with briefing seminars and staff development workshops for schools participating in this educational experiment.  After evaluation of the educational outcomes in the leading participating Chinese medical schools, programs to remedy the identified weaknesses will be initiated.  To have valid results from this educational experiment, it was strongly emphasized that the project should be implemented in at least three countries, possibly in different regions of the world.

A substantial amount of time was devoted to a discussion regarding the IIME Worldwide Database of Medical Schools.  Since the WHO stopped publishing the Directory of the Medical Schools, it was agreed that the need exists for a current database, and the IIME is fulfilling this need.  However, it was noted that since other organizations also maintain information on medical schools, it was suggested that an in-depth a cooperation between the IIME and ECFMG in this effort would be beneficial.  This collaborative effort is currently under discussion.

There was also an in-depth discussion of the relationship between the IIME and WFME projects.  While the focus of the IIME project is development of specific competency-oriented medical education, the WFME has developed and will test process standards to be used in the international accreditation of medical schools.  Consequently, it was agreed that although the two endeavors are complementary, the projects should continue to be developed separately at the present time.

In conclusion, the progress of project development was presented.  The "GMER" document and the "Glossary of Medical Education Terms" should be published as soon as possible in different journals and translated into Chinese, as well as Spanish and French.  The "GMER" should also be posted on the IIME Website.  In addition, an informational newsletter of IIME activities is to be developed for worldwide distribution to medical schools and medical educators to increase the "visibility" of the project.

The meeting was then adjourned with appreciation expressed to the Advisory Committee Members for their guidance, support, and commitment.