Professor Olle ten Cate is awarded the KI Prize for Research in Medical Education

KIPRIME is an international prize awarded for outstanding research in medical and health professions education. The purpose is to recognise and stimulate outstanding research in the field and to promote long-term improvements of educational practices in medical training. Professor ten Cate will receive the award and a generous monetary prize in Stockholm in October 2026.

Commenting on his prize win, Professor ten Cate says:

“Receiving the KIPRIME Prize is a tremendous honour, as I have always regarded it as the highest distinction in medical education scholarship. When I started my career in 1980 with a deliberate decision to devote my energy to medical education, I could not have dreamt that my work, ideas and convictions would one day lead to this high honour. Early on, I sometimes felt lonely in an institution with little experience in health professions education research, but over the years the networks I built nationally and internationally provided support and inspiration. I will donate the prize to the newly established HPE Entrust Foundation to support scholarly careers and networks in health professions education around the globe”.

Impact on health profession education

Professor Olle ten Cate is one of the world’s leading scholars in medical education and his research is distinguished by its conceptual depth and transformative impact on how medical education understands competence, assessment, and progression. An emeritus professor at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, he is best known for developing Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs), a framework that has transformed competency-based education and assessment in health professions training worldwide. 
 
“I hope health professions educators reconsider what matters most when deciding whether learners are ready to complete their training. Entrustment with patient care is the highest-stakes form of workplace-based assessment. It should include not only raters and trainees, but also the consequences for the patient, requiring a prospective mindset from clinical supervisors. Equally important is the gradual increase of trainee autonomy, one of the most powerful educational tools we have, and EPAs can help turn this principle into practice,” says Professor ten Cate.

Beyond EPAs, his scholarship spans assessment, clinical reasoning, peer-learning, motivation, and educational quality. His work has not only advanced theory in the field but also changed everyday educational practice in clinical settings worldwide. His body of work exemplifies the highest level of scholarly impact: linking conceptual work and theory with concrete improvements in the training and day-to-day assessment practices in healthcare systems.