BACKGROUND The issue of quality assurance (QA) and quality improvement (QI), being the quality of medical education intimately related to the quality of the health care, is becoming of paramount importance worldwide. OBJECTIVE To describe a model of implementing a system for internal QA and QI within a post-graduate paediatric training programme based on the ISO 9001:2000 standard. METHODS For the ISO 9001:2000 standard, the curriculum was managed as a series of interrelated processes and their level of function was monitored by ad hoc elaborated objective indicators. RESULTS The training programme was fragmented in 19 interlinked processes, 15 related procedures and 24 working instructions. All these materials, along with the quality policy, the mission, the strategies and the values were made publicly available. Based on the measurable indicators developed to monitor some of the processes, areas of weakness of the system were objectively identified and consequently QI actions implemented. The appropriateness of all this allowed the programme to finally achieve an official ISO 9000:2001 certification. CONCLUSIONS The application of the ISO 9001:2000 standard served to develop an internal QA and QI system and to meet most of the standards developed for QA in higher and medical education.