Designing Criteria and Indices for Educational Ranking of Paramedical Sciences Schools in Iran

Background: Assessing the statue of educational services in schools of Paramedical Sciences can help authorities to plan for further promotion through identifying schools' strengths and weaknesses. Objective: To design criteria and indices for educational ranking of associate programs of Paramedical Sciences including Laboratory Sciences, Operating Room Nursing, Technology of Radiology, Anesthesiology, Nuclear Medicine, Technology of Radiotherapy and Medical Emergencies in Iran. Methods: In an expert committee, criteria used in worldwide rankings and medical education standards were reviewed. Then a set of criteria and indices which were compatible to Iran educational system was devised and their weights were defined through consensus developing methods. Each school was asked to introduce a representative to collect schools’ information and schools were visited to verify the gathered data. Then schools' scores for each criterion were calculated. Results: A set of 42 criteria sorted as a tree diagram was devised. Main branches of this tree included input branch consisting of National Entrance Examination (Weight: 2%), faculty members (weight: 18%), and facilities and equipment (weight: 20%), process branch consisting of administrations (weight: 40.5%) and support and counseling systems (weight: 4.5%) and output branch consisting of students' output (weight: 9%) and faculty members' output (weight: 6%). Conclusion: This study provided the educational strengths and weaknesses of Paramedical Sciences programs in Iran. The results can be used in devising practical strategies for qualitative and quantitative improvement . Keywords: Education, Allied health, Ranking, Stratification, School, Associate program