Quality Improvement Initiative to Prepare Medical Students With Harm Reduction Principles for Substance Use Care.

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Public Health
• Physician-Patient Communication

Background:

• Undergraduate medical education increasingly integrates harm reduction (HR).
• Existing HR curriculum assessments primarily focus on skills like overdose reversal.
• There's a gap in evaluating HR curricula for physician-patient communication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of a harm reduction (HR) curriculum in teaching physician-patient communication.
• To assess student understanding and attitudes towards HR-based communication strategies.

Main Methods:

• A quality improvement approach using two Plan-Do-Study-Act cycles was implemented.
• Student surveys (Likert scale) and a focus group were used to measure curriculum effectiveness.
• Thematic analysis of focus group data was conducted using Borkan's Immersion/Crystallization methodology.

Main Results:

• Self-reported understanding of HR communication significantly improved post-session (mean 3.6 to 4.2, P < .001).
• Students expressed strong interest in HR and found patient narratives valuable for understanding communication.
• Students recommended incorporating diverse patient perspectives and broader HR exposure.

Conclusions:

• A focused session on substance use interviews shows potential for teaching HR communication principles.
• Future curricula should emphasize patient narratives and diverse patient representation.
• Further research is needed to determine if HR education improves patient care outcomes.