Why social accountability of medical schools in Sudan can lead to better primary healthcare and excellence in medical education?

Abstract

Introduction: Medical education in Sudan continues to evolve and progress with proliferation in the number of medical schools after 1990. Social factors and the geographical location of Sudan will increase the opportunity of success of medical schools to be socially accountable. In this analysis, we explained why social accountability is needed in Sudan and how this can enhance both excellence in medical education and primary health care, especially in rural areas. Methodology: PubMed, scopus Medline, and Google Scholar were searched for published-English literature concerning social accountability of medical schools in Sudan and worldwide were reviewed regardless of the time limit. We have also included examples of medical schools from Sudan and the Middle East to reflect on their experience in social accountability. Results: In this critical review, we have shown that social accountability will come with benefits for medical schools and the community. Implementation of social accountability in medical schools in Sudan will increase the effectiveness of medical schools' productivity, research output, and health service in urban and rural areas. There is an urgent need for social accountability alliance in Sudan to increase collaboration between medical schools. This will increase the benefits of social accountability for all stakeholders and also increases the competency in social medicine within the medical school curriculum. Conclusion: Social accountability is regarded as a sign of excellence in medical education. Primary care physicians in Sudan are expected to be the leaders in the implementation of social accountability. This analysis answered two important questions about why medical schools in Sudan should be socially accountable? And do we need a special structure of social accountability in Sudan?

Social Accountability in Medical Education: Students’ Perspective

“…Each college in the university has a student club, including a social team responsible for educating and raising the community's health awareness through campaigns. Prioritizing the research based on the population's needs is one of the ways that can successfully improve SA of an institution (Strasser et al, 2013;Ahmed et al, 2020).…”

“…Furthermore, other countries like Sudan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt have also taken initiatives toward achieving community-based, socially accountable medical education. A study that assessed the SA of the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Gezira (FMUG), Sudan, concluded their educational program as socially responsible and socially accountable only in certain aspects (Ahmed et al, 2020). Hosny et al (2015) suggested using the conceptualization production usability (CPU) model to assess SA in medical institutions.…”

The implementation of social accountability in medical schools in Eastern Mediterranean region: A scoping review

“… 46 Among the enabling factors are accreditation, leadership, a formal SA structure in medical schools, the support of champions, 14 and the formation of alliances. 47 Furthermore, the studies’ examination revealed that the highest number of publications came from Iran, which has the largest number of medical schools in the region. 13 Factors that might have been crucial to the broader spread of SA in Iran include its integration of medical education into the health system and its inclusion of supervised community-related activities in medical education.…”

“… 13 Factors that might have been crucial to the broader spread of SA in Iran include its integration of medical education into the health system and its inclusion of supervised community-related activities in medical education. 48 Additionally, collaboration and alliances between different medical schools are especially important, 47 however, the review showed that most of the articles reflected work from a single medical school and only a few were from two or more medical schools; two of the articles from Sudan were produced by a consortium of international medical schools that worked jointly on SA. 37 …”

Imagining the Future of Learning in Healthcare: The GAME 2019 #FuturistForum

“…Increased focus has also been devoted to the accountability of medical schools to review their approaches to learning and assessment. Specifically, approaches to learning and assessment are evaluated in terms of their response to population needs and their ability to ensure the development of health professionals with relevant competencies to support the evolutions in health systems [4][5][6]. Today, scholars and educationalists see medical education as a continuum increasingly referred to as lifelong learning, from undergraduate medical education (UME) to graduate medical education (GME) and continuing medical education (CME) or continuing professional development (CPD) [7,8].…”