Social Accountability from the Perspective of Students and Professors Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Indicators of social accountability in medical education institutions are necessary for the improvement of community health needs. In this regard, the present research aimed to investigate the social accountability at Ilam University of Medical Sciences in the period before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The present survey research was carried out in 2022 on students and professors of medicine and dentistry (n=788). The data were collected by standard questionnaire of Social Accountability of Medical Education. This questionnaire included 0 components and 85 items.

The results showed that the mean scores of the components of medical school standards range (24.9) (P=0.0002), amount of quality improvement in education and research (34.4) (P=0.0003), amount of mandatory mechanism for accreditation (23.2) (P=0.003), and amount of global principles with the characteristics of the context (33.8) (P=0.002) were in an unfavorable situation during the COVID-19 pandemic from the point of view of both professors and students. These values had a statistically significant difference (P<0.05) with those in the the pre-COVID-19 pandemic. The component of evolving roles of doctors and other health professions (82.5) (P=0.098) and responsive and effective management (74.8) (P=0.0001) were in a favorable situation during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Given the diversity of the performance of groups regarding the mentioned areas and criteria and considering that most of the cases related to education received a low score, there is a need to create a foundation for increasing social accountability.