Undergraduate Medical Education

Faculty of Medicine

Accreditation

Full Accreditation through 2024

The Committee on the Accreditation of Canadian Medical Schools (CACMS), working with the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) in the United States, ensures that Canadian medical schools’ undergraduate medical education programs meet the quality expected when producing tomorrow’s doctors.

Dalhousie Medical School’s undergraduate medical education program is fully accredited by the CACMS and LCME and has met all requirements of the 96 elements within the 12 accreditation standards.

The next full site visit will take place in the 2024-2025 academic year and will include virtual and in-person visits.

Accreditation 2024-2025

After successful accreditation in 2017, Dalhousie Medical School is preparing for its next full accreditation during the 2024-2025 academic year. We want our learners and educators to have an MD program that they can be proud of, and one that meets national standards. That's why we're welcoming a panel of national peers and medical education experts from CACMS on February 17-20 and March 24-25, 2025, to review every component our MD program.

CACMS will base our MD program on 12 standards that focus on:

  • mission, planning, organization and integrity
  • leadership and administration
  • academic and learning environments
  • faculty preparation, productivity, participation and policies
  • educational resources and infrastructure
  • competencies, curricular objectives and curricular design
  • curricular content
  • curricular management, evaluation and enhancement
  • teaching, supervision, assessment and student and patient safety
  • medical student selection, assignment and progress
  • medical student academic support, career advising and records
  • medical student health services, personal counseling and financial aid services

The medical school started its preparation for the 2025 visit in early 2023.

Click here to see the accreditation timeline.

What is accreditation?

CACMS describes accreditation as a process by which institutions and programs voluntarily undergo an extensive peer evaluation of their compliance with accepted standards for educational quality. Through accreditation, CACMS provides assurance to medical students, graduates, the medical profession, healthcare institutions, health authorities, regulatory authorities and the public that

  • educational programs culminating in the award of the MD degree meet reasonable, generally-accepted, and appropriate national standards for educational quality, and
  • graduates of such programs have a complete and valid educational experience sufficient to prepare them for the next stage of their training

Accreditation affects a medical school at all levels. While it focuses on a school's MD program, it should be thought of as an ongoing exercise in institutional quality improvement. By staying accredited, Dalhousie Medical School can continue to graduate top-quality physicians, offer residency training programs in family medicine and specialty fields, improve health care and patient outcomes in the Maritimes and conduct research that's relevant to the region's health priorities.

Preparing for accreditation

There are three main components to accreditation: the Data Collection Instrument (DCI), the Independent Student Analysis (ISA) and the Medical School Self-Study (MSS). They're reflective exercises completed ahead of the CACMS site visit that involve students, faculty and staff, and will identify our MD program's strengths and areas for improvement.

Data Collection Instrument: The DCI consists of questions and narrative responses to each of the 12 accreditation standards. These are answered by individuals most knowledgeable in these topics.

Independent Student Analysis: As with all accreditation visits, an ISA is completed by a medical school's student body. This is a student-led review of the MD program, individual units and curriculum, student support services and the learning environment.

Students will also meet with accreditation surveyors during the February 17-20 and March 24-25, 2025, site visits.

Medical School Self-Study: When completed, the DCI, ISA and other supporting documents such as the most recent graduate questionnaire are brought to the medical school self-study task force and its sub-committees. Based on these documents and input from the medical school community, these committees create their own reports, which are then put together into one institutional report: the MSS. Faculty, students and staff have broad input into the MSS.

The MSS, ISA, graduate questionnaire and the completed DCI will be submitted to the accreditation survey team three months prior to their February 2025 site visit in November 2024.

Learn more about the CACMS procedure.

Essential accreditation reading