Social Accountability and Accreditation

Impacting Health System Performance and Population Health

Abstract

Today’s reality all over the world has shown a huge disparity in the quality, equity, relevance, partnership and efficiency in the provision of health services resulting in huge gap of health status in many societies across the globe, be it in the developed and the developing countries. A number of reasons have been discussed. One most important reason is the disconnected between medical schools and health profession education institutions with their ecosystem and community they are mandated to serve. The concept of social accountability endorsed by the WHO since 1995 has not really been embraced by medical and health profession education institutions and not yet supported by key policy makers and health managers in many regions and countries. A few case studies have proved that the concept of social accountability is feasible and managable; and it eventually brings beneficial impact for the society in improving the health status. Existing guidelines and approaches  could be used to accelerate the adoption of social accountability as long as key actors from international, national, institution and community levels are orchestrated congruently. A new paradigm in school’s accreditation embracing social accountability concept could reinforce this venture.