VCU School of Medicine
The “Shoestring” Award
Gold
The VCU School of Medicine’s LCME site visit occurred in February 2024. Through the preparation of the Data Collection Instrument (DCI), we realized that our medical school community would benefit from an education campaign on the standards and elements of the accreditation process. Beginning in the summer of 2023, working closely with the Office of Medical Education team, we collaboratively designed a campaign to educate our faculty, staff, students and leaders on the critical nature of accreditation, the updated standards under which we would be evaluated and the LCME site visit and related preparations. Campaign components included:
- The creation of a section on our web site dedicated to accreditation
- The creation of a weekly newsletter called The Standard Bearer focused on LCME standards and their importance
- Strategic and coordinated information-sharing at a variety of standing department, faculty and student meetings school-wide
- Special messages and videos from the Dean
- A monitor slide takeover
- Posters during the site visit, post-visit messaging and contingency planning for various outcomes
- Messaging and a celebration following receipt of accreditation
What was the most impactful part of your entry?
Two elements of the campaign are the most impactful part of this entry. By its metrics, The Standard Bearer newsletter was well-read by our medical school community. Open rates for this weekly newsletter were well above industry standard, especially among our M.D. students, whose open rate averaged an astounding 78%, and reached as high as 94.3% on one particular edition. Faculty and staff open rates were as high as 50-60% on multiple occasions throughout the seventh-month campaign, helping to ensure members of our community gained useful information and were well-informed about the LCME standards and elements prior to the visit. They understood the case for a successful accreditation and saw the positive outcome. Additionally, the consistency of communication along multiple channels also contributed substantially to our campaign.
What challenge did you overcome?
Start early. We began the communications with announcements and reminders in a few meetings. By May 1, 2023, the LCME was a standing item in our executive committee meeting, which 80 people from across the school attend on a monthly basis. We realized in the middle of our preparations that the education campaign was needed and quickly built it out. It is important to embed communications with the DCI preparations from the beginning.
Finally, LCME accreditation is not sexy. And unless you eat, breathe, and live LCME, it is not on the radar of most people and its critical importance, and the challenge of accreditation can be taken for granted.
That’s why it was important to provide clear and serious messages, but to have appropriate lightheartedness to gain people’s attention. As an example, one of our posters in the prep room for the teams engaging with the site visitors borrowed from the World War II slogan and encouraged our constituents to “Keep Calm and LCME On!”
Contact:
Laura Ingles
laura.ingles@vcuhealth.org