LCME AccreditationThe Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) is the nationally recognized accrediting authority for medical education programs leading to the MD degree in the United States and Canada. The LCME is sponsored jointly by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) and the American Medical Association (AMA) with each organization providing an LCME Secretary. Current Secretaries are Barbara Barzansky, PhD for the AMA and Veronica Catanese, MD for the AAMC.
In determining accreditation status, the LCME conducts periodic accreditation site visits. The LCME conducted its most recent accreditation visit at UNM School of Medicine in February 2018. This site visit resulted in continued full accreditation of the SOM with the next site visit planned for the 2025-2026 academic year.
In between site visits, the SOM has a Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) committee, chaired by Dr. Rebecca Hartley, for ongoing monitoring of accreditation standards. This committee is divided into seven subcommittees, each of which monitors one, two, or three of the accreditation standards and the associated elements.
The seven subcommittees are charged by the CQI committee with the task of reviewing all the standards/elements, gathering data, and writing periodic reports about specific areas of medical education at UNM.
1. Mission, Planning, Organization, and Integrity
2. Leadership and Administration
3. Academic and Learning Environments
4. Faculty Preparation, Productivity, Participation and Policies
5. Educational Resources and Infrastructure
6. Competencies, Curricular Objectives and Curricular Design
7. Curricular Content
8. Curriculum Management, Evaluation and Enhancement
9. Teaching, Supervision, Assessment and Student and Patient Safety
10. Medical Student Selection, Assignment and Progress
11. Medical Student Academic Support, Career Advising and Educational Records
12. Medical Student Health Series, Personal Counseling and Financial Aid Services
Approximately 18 months prior to the next site visit, the subcommittees will expand, to include junior and senior faculty, administrators, staff and students as they begin writing the accreditation self-study (termed DCI for Data Collection Instrument). That process will involve answering in-depth questions posed by the LCME regarding every component of our medical education program as outlined in the 12 Accreditation Standards.
This provides the SOM with the opportunity for self-evaluation and improvement as well as certification that the SOM is meeting the educational standards for accreditation. After completing the database questions, each committee will also write a brief report on their topics and these will be integrated into an institutional self-study summary which accompanies the DCI.
Also accompanying the DCI will be a report from the Independent Student Analysis (ISA) subcommittee. This subcommittee will conduct a survey of our medical students' experiences and opinions to develop a comprehensive picture of how students perceive the medical school, the medical education program, student services, learning environment and adequacy of educational resources.
The entire report will then be submitted to the LCME approximately 4 months prior to the institutional site visit in 2025-26.