PMCWA Accreditation

PMCWA is the prevocational training accreditation authority endorsed by the Australian Medical Council (AMC) to assess prevocational training programs across Western Australia (WA). The assessment of prevocational training programs involves the assessment of health sites, hospitals, private or community placements and each individual term (or rotation) that employs, seconds or places PGY1 and PGY2. This assessment is against the National standards and requirements for prevocational training (PGY1 and PGY2) programs and terms.

PMCWA also assesses PGY3+ resident positions under a separate mandate from the Director General, WA Health, utilising the same National standards and requirements for prevocational training (PGY1 and PGY2) programs and terms.

The accreditation process occurs over a four-year cycle with PMCWA assessing both the health service as a whole and each individual term. As outlined in the diagram below, the standard cycle has three main components: full survey, follow up actions if required and a mid-cycle progress report. Follow up actions are only required when there are unmet standards and conditions are applied, which results in Provisional Accreditation. Full Accreditation is only awarded when all accreditation standards are met.

Process

The following are the types of follow up actions that may be used for the Accreditation Committee to confirm with the site that action is being made to meet the previously unmet standards:

Action	Description	Main Use
Outstanding Conditions Action Report (OSCAR)	A report to be completed by the site, outlining the action(s) they have completed to address the outstanding conditions(s) as a result of unmet or substantially met standards	For low or medium risk concerns
Follow up survey	Surveyors conduct a follow up accreditation survey across all standards	For predominantly high and extreme risk concerns
Self assessment against the standards	A report to be completed by the Medical Education Unit (or equivalent) to provide a comprehensive analysis across all standards for the term	To follow up for new terms, when issues are identified in a mid-cycle progress report or ad hoc feedback suggests a need
JMO phone interview	PMCWA secretariat to conduct phone interviews with JMOs	To obtain feedback to check on implementation of changes identified by the site

Junior Doctors:

JMO: Junior Medical Officer which includes:
- Interns as PGY1 (Postgraduate year ones)
- Resident Medical Officers (RMOs) as PGY2+
Prevocational doctor/prevocational trainee: a JMO as defined above

Accreditation Type: PMCWA assesses prevocational training programs across the whole health service and within each individual term, as explained below:

Type	Accreditation approach
Health Site Wide (HSW): The health service, hospital, community placement, health care group, that governs the prevocational training program for their site(s). The scope of the HSW accreditation will differ between organisations depending on their governance arrangements and will be approved by the PMCWA.	Accreditation at the HSW level includes all accreditation standards.
Placement Health Site (PHS): A smaller site that is partly self governed and partly governed by an HSW (as per definition above) with a small number of JMOs	Accreditation at the PHS level includes a subset of the full accreditation standards with a focus on: Local facilities Local governance
Term: The unit or department that JMOs rotate through. Accreditation at the Term level PMCWA assesses compliance to standards such as supervision, teaching and assessment within each rotation.	Accreditation at the term level includes a subset of the full accreditation standards with a focus on: Clinical experience Support Supervision Education

Accreditation Level: The postgraduate year level (either PGY1, PGY2 or PGY3+) that PMCWA has deemed is appropriate, applicable for both HSW and term accreditation.

PGY1: the HSW and/or term is applicable for PGY1, PGY2 and/or PGY3+
PGY2: the HSW and/or term is applicable for PGY2 and/or PGY3+ (but NOT PGY1)
PGY3+: the HSW and/or term is applicable for ONLY PGY3+

Compliance with Accreditation Standards: The measure of how compliant a term or health site is against each of the 75 standards:

Met: Compliance to the standard is achieved
Not met or Unmet: There is inadequate or no compliance to the standard.

Accreditation Status: The accreditation awarded to the HSW or site which may be:

Full Accreditation: All relevant standards have been met with no outstanding conditions or follow up actions required.
Provisional Accreditation: Not all standards have been met, conditions have been applied with follow up actions required or for new terms/health services. Accreditation is provisional on all standards being met within a given timeframe.
Accreditation to be withdrawn: Substantial number/depth of standards are unmet, or conditions continue to be unmet after the follow up actions have occurred. PMCWA to escalate to the health service’s executive team.
Not Accredited: The health site as a whole or individual term is deemed to NOT be suitable and therefore is not accredited.

Accreditation Review Types:

Routine reviews: The accreditation cycle is four years (as stipulated by the AMC’s Domains and procedures for assessment and accreditation, Quality Assurance) and includes the following steps:
- Full Survey: The first step in the four-year cycle at which time PMCWA assesses both the health service as a whole and each term individually within that health service.
- Mid-Cycle Progress Report: A written report scheduled to be completed by the health service, two years following the Full Survey, any new challenges or changes which may impact on accreditation status.
Follow up reviews: Where standards are not met and conditions are applied, one of the following follow up actions, that is deemed to be the most suitable, will be applied.

Action	Description	Main Use
Outstanding Conditions Action Report (OSCAR)	A report to be completed by the site, outlining the action(s) they have completed to address the outstanding conditions(s) as a result of unmet standards.	For low, medium or high risk concerns with a due date of between 1 to 12 months depending on the situation.
Follow up Survey	Surveyors conduct a follow up accreditation survey across all standards.	For high risk concerns
Self-Assessment	A report to be completed by the Medical Education Unit (or equivalent) to provide their own analysis of their compliance across all standards. Can be used for the term or HSW	To follow up for new terms, new HSWs, or where ad hoc feedback suggests a need.
JMO Interview	JMOs are interviewed on a one on one or small group to check on specific concerns. May be conducted by either PMCWA or the HSW depending on the issue.	To obtain feedback and check on implementation of changes identified by the site.