NMC Drops Stipend from medical colleges ranking Criteria, here's what else is missing

New Delhi: Financial entitlements, such as stipends paid to interns and resident doctors, are no longer a criterion for a medical institute's accreditation and rating.

Even though payment of financial entitlements such as stipends to interns and resident doctors used to be a parameter under the criterion of students' admission, attainment of competence and placement status in the draft framework that NMC prepared for accreditation and rating of medical institutes in partnership with the Quality Control of India (QCI), it has now been dropped by the Apex Medical Commission in the recently released Draft Framework for Accreditation, ranking of medical colleges.

Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that specifying the new draft framework released by the Commission's Medical Assessment and Rating Board (MARB), comprised of altogether 11 criteria and 78 parameters.

These 11 criteria for assessment and rating of medical colleges include (1) Curriculum Implementation and Capacity Building Activities, (2) Clinical Exposure, clinical training, internship, and training facilities, (3) Teaching-learning environment- Physical, psychological and occupational, (4) Students' admission, attainment of competence and progression, (5) Human resource and teaching-learning process, (6) Assessment policy (formative, internal & summative assessment), (7) Research output and impact, (8) Financial Resource (recurring & non-recurring expenditures, (9) Community outreach programs, (10) Quality assessment system, and (11) Feedback and perception of stakeholders.

However, none of the parameters mentioned under these 11 criteria mention stipend paid to interns and resident doctors. On the other hand, the "Draft Framework for Accreditation and Ranking of Colleges Regulated by National Medical Commission", which was released in 2023, had a parameter titled "Provisions of Financial Entitlements (Remunerated Posts/Stipendiary Positions) created by college" under the Criterion titled "Students Admission & Attainment of Competence."

Also Read: NMC Releases Draft Framework for accreditation, ranking of Medical Colleges- 11 Criteria, 78 Parameters

This parameter under the previously released Draft framework was related to provisions of stipend to Interns and Residents in Medical College. "NMC has laid down that Interns and Residents will be given stipends. Based on data captured for this parameter, Intern wise & Resident wise for last 6 months, given salary/stipend by College will be captured," the 2023 Draft mentioned.

This is not the only aspect changed in the newly released Draft framework for accreditation and rating of medical colleges. The new version also excludes some of the other parameters for evaluating the medical institutions. The other key changes between the old and new frameworks are as follows:

(a) While in the previous draft framework, which was prepared by the Quality Council of India (QCI), there were 92 parameters (20 qualitative parameters and 72 quantitative parameters), the number has dropped to 78 parameters (26 qualitative and 52 quantitative parameters). 

(b) Previously, the proportion of full-time or regular teachers to the overall faculty requirement used to be considered for rating the medical colleges. However, this criterion has now been dropped. 

Under the previous framework, the parameter titled "Programme wise number of recruited Faculty Staff vis-à-vis Regulatory specifications" dealt with the programme-wise Faculty staff requirement, based on the minimum standard requirement (MSR) laid down for UG and PG programmes by NMC. One of the required conditions under this parameter specified that "overall proportion of Professor and Associate Professors is greater than total number of Professor & Associate Professors required."

(c) Even though NMC has kept the Criterion of Research Output and Impact, it has eliminated the parameter of "Publications in High Quartile Category Journals". 

The parameters under this criterion, as specified in the newly released draft, include total number of research paper publications by Faculty Staff with Institutional Affiliation in last 2 years in indexed Journals, cumulative citation scores of research papers published in indexed journals in last 2 years, cumulative impact factors of all publications published by the institute in indexed journals in last 2 years, number of patents/designs registration filled by the institute in last 2 years, number of patents granted, converted to products and commercialized in last 2 years, number of extramural funded projects completed/ongoing in collaboration with industry/nongovernment (National, State/International) funding agencies in last 2 financial years, number of extramural funded projects completed/ongoing/being funded by government agency in India and abroad like SCIR, ICMR & DST etc. in last 2 financial years, and number of clinical trials initiative/going on/approved for different phases in last 2 calendar year.

Earlier, the framework required calculating the cumulative citation scores only in Q1 and Q2 (the top 50%) research publications. However, under the new draft framework, citations in all the indexed journals will be considered. However, it will assign only half the score for citations in Q3 and Q4 (bottom 50%) journals, compared to the top ones.

(d) Not only the number of parameters but also the relative weightage assigned to some of the broad categories has been changed. The criteria and the changes in the weightage (for scoring against a total of 1000 marks) are as follows:

i. While the previous weightage for curriculum implementation and capacity building activities was 70, it has now been revised to 100.

ii. The weightage for clinical exposure, clinical training, internship and clinical facilities has changed from 160 to 100 in the new framework.

iii. In the case of Teaching-Learning Environment, the previous weightage was 100. However, it has now been increased to 130.

iv. The weightage for Students' admission, attainment of competence & Progression has changed from 130 to 140.

v. For Human resource and teaching learning process, the weightage remains the same i.e. 160.

vi. However, for Assessment policy (formative, internal & summative assessment), the weightage has been increased from 20 to 60 in the new framework.

vii. The weightage remains same i.e. 100 for the criterion of Research output and impact.

viii. In the case of Financial-Resource (Recurring & non-recurring expenditures) also, the weightage remains the same i.e. 100

ix. The weightage has been reduced from 50 to 40 for the criterion titled "Community Outreach Programs".

x. It remains the same i.e. 30 for the criterion of Quality Assurance Syatem.

xi. However, for the criterion titled "Feedback & Perception of Stakeholders". the weightage has been reduced from the previous weightage i.e. 80 to 40 in the recently released draft framework.

Even though the criterion called "Students' Admission & Attainment of Competence" has dropped the parameter of providing stipends to interns and resident doctors, the other parameters including the NEET scores of incoming students and graduates, performance of students in the exit exams, and number of graduates pursuing higher education, remain the same.

In the new framework, NMC has proposed a department-wise analysis and review of students' performance in formative and internal assessments and subsequent corrective actions taken by the college.

The previous draft framework was prepared by the Quality Council of India (QCI). While NMC MARB is responsible for carrying out inspections for granting permissions for establishment of new medical college, increase of MBBS/PG/Super-speciality seats, renewal of permission for existing medical colleges, earlier it had mentioned that QCI provides a mechanism for independent third-party assessment of products and services.

NMC had signed an MoU with QCI, aiming to promote quality through national accreditation of testing, inspection, and certification bodies which are internationally recognized.

In the newly released framework NMC mentioned that it "intends to carry-out accreditation & rating of all Medical Colleges regulated by the NMC, through an independent third party agency."

Also Read: How will Medical Colleges be Rated? QCI releases Draft Standardised procedure