Meeting abstract
PEER EDUCATION AS AN INNOVATIVE APPROACH IN IMPROVEMENT OF YOUTH MENTAL HEALTH CARE
Kristina Stamenković
orcid.org/0000-0002-8650-4837
; School of Medicine, University of Zagreb, Croatia
Katarina Skopljak
; Ordination Dr. Horvat-Hodžić – family medicine practice, Gornja Stubica, Croatia
Hana Lučev
; Department of Emergency Medicine Zadar County, Croatia
Mirela Šentija Knežević
; City Office for Health, Zagreb, Croatia
Miroslav Hanževački
; Health Center Zagreb West, Croatia
Abstract
Introduction: Peer education is growing in popularity and practice as a powerful tool for health promotion. Promotion of mental health helps adolescents in building resilience so that they can cope well in difficult situations or adversities. In order to take a more active role in improvement of youth mental health care Croatian Medical Students' Association in collaboration with City Office for Health in Zagreb and Regional Health Center Zagreb - West started a project on mental health promotion. Project is based on peer education, with previously educated medical students conducting workshops in high schools, in order to emphasize the importance of early prevention and mental health promotion. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether peer education is a good framework for mental health promotion among youth, with physicians actively involved as educators and supervisors.
Methods: There were 7 workshops conducted in 17 classes, with 390 high school students participating. Every workshop was evaluated with Evaluation form, questioning students' opinion on usefulness, satisfaction, content etc. High school students were also given Self-Consciousness Scale (Fenigstein, Scheier, Buss, 1975) and Private Self-Consciousness Scale (Huić, 2009) before and after the project to objectively evaluate benefits on their self-consciousness.
Results: Preliminary results showed a statistically relevant change in all aspects of the Self-Consciousness Scale in the post, compared to prequestionnaires. The biggest improvement is seen in the private self-consciousness part (t = -3,474; p<.01), but there were also improvements in the parts evaluating emotions (t= -3,320; p<.01), cognition (t= -2,336; p<.05), and body image (t= -2,580; p<.01). Students reported subjective improvement of their mental health and high satisfaction with project.
Conclusion: Peer education should be considered as a powerful framework for active involvement in improvement of youth mental health care, in collaboration with mental health services and efforts from teachers and parents.
Keywords
peer education; mental health promotion; mental health care; youth
Hrčak ID:
218582
URI
Publication date:
31.12.2018.
Visits: 1.609 *