Can first-year medical students acquire quality improvement knowledge prior to substantial clinical exposure? A mixed-methods evaluation of a pre-clerkship curriculum that uses education as the context for learning.

Early exposure to QI principles that uses medical education as the context may be an effective intervention to foster QI competencies at an early stage and ultimately promote engagement in clinical QI. Moreover, PRIME also provides a mechanism to drive improvements in medical education. Future research is warranted to better understand the impact of education as a context for later engagement in clinical QI applications as well as the potential for QI methods to be translated directly into education.