Accreditation and evaluation of veterinary medical institutes - a Pakistani perspective.

The Higher Education Commission of Pakistan (HEC) is an independent, autonomous and constitutionally established institution that provides primary funding for higher education in Pakistan, which it also oversees, regulates and accredits. According to the HEC Charter: 'the HEC of Pakistan may set up national or regional evaluation councils or authorise any existing council/or similar body to carry out accreditation of institutions including their departments, facilities and disciplines by giving them appropriate ratings'. At present, 14 accreditation bodies operate under the umbrella of the HEC. Five were established under the HEC's Quality Assurance Agency, while nine councils associated with the accreditation and evaluation of medical institutes are independent bodies that were extant before the HEC was created, and are recognised by the HEC. The authors will discuss the role of the Pakistan Veterinary Medical Council (PVMC), the accreditation of veterinary institutes and associated issues of concern. They suggest that the PVMC should adopt an unbiased approach to new and established veterinary institutes to attain uniform accreditation of all veterinary institutes throughout the country. In addition, the government should consult the accreditation councils and professional bodies before setting up new institutes. The authors also suggest that, instead of placing new veterinary institutes under the aegis of non-veterinary universities, they should be made sub-campuses of established veterinary universities. In time, they will emerge as established institutes in their own right.