Outcomes, accreditation, interprofessional education, and the Tower of Babel

ABSTRACTEffective education necessitates a shared mental model of what and how learners should be taught. Students in various healthcare professions education programs learn together most effectively when programs have a shared mental model for education. Because healthcare professions education programs must satisfy their respective accreditation standards, the terminology of those standards reflects that body’s shared mental model for education. Thus, interprofessional education (IPE) would be facilitated by common educational lexicon across accrediting bodies.In this study, the terminology used in the accreditation standards from several healthcare professions educational programs was measured. An analysis was conducted to illustrate whether terms used by accreditors were internally consistent and whether there was consistency across professions. Counts of learning outcomes terms used revealed little internal consistency within each set of standards. Additionally, the terms in the various standards doc...