In January 2002, the Commission on Accreditation for Allied Health Education Programs (CAAHEP) appointed the ARC-ST as the official Committee on Accreditation (CoA) for educational accreditation in Surgical Assisting. As a result of this action, in March 2002 the ARC-ST created the Subcommittee on Accreditation for Surgical Assisting* (SASA) to help administrate the surgical assisting accreditation process.
I n April 2002, the original Standards and Guidelines for the Profession of Surgical Assisting were approved and SASA began accepting applications for surgical assistant program accreditation. Within the first five years, ten (10) Surgical Assisting programs earned CAAHEP accreditation.
More recently, effective August 1, 2008, CAAHEP approved the revised 2008 Standards and Guidelines for Education in Surgical Assisting reflecting outcomes based accreditation (please see link below).
*SASA membership includes representatives from the ARC/STSA, AST and NSAA.
