Efficacy of a smoking prevention programme in Catalan secondary schools: a cluster‐randomized controlled trial in Spain

Abstract

A school-based educational intervention for secondary school students in Catalonia, Spain was not found to lead to a statistically significant reduction of smoking prevalence and incidence.

Long‐term effectiveness of a combined student—parent and a student‐only smoking prevention intervention among 7th grade school children in Berlin, Germany

“…Although the effects were not statistically significant, our results indicated that the lowest proportion of smokers was among students in the combined student–parent intervention. Our findings are therefore partly consistent with other international studies . For instance, Vartiainen et al ., who implemented a combined smoking prevention intervention into the school curriculum including teachers, school nurses and parents, found a lower proportion of daily and weekly smoking students in the intervention group after 2 years .…”

“…The authors reported a lower proportion of regular and occasional smokers among the intervention group compared to a control group after 4 years. However, the results were not statistically significant .…”

“…Smoking prevention efforts in youths have focused traditionally on schools , primarily because of their almost universal reach when targeting children and adolescents. School‐based prevention programmes have evolved continuously from the provision of information through moderators or teachers to the integration of peer‐to‐peer, social influence or social competence strategies and others . Because of the mixed evidence regarding the effectiveness of traditional school‐based smoking prevention strategies, multimodal approaches started to combine school‐based approaches with other strategies outside the school curricula and environment .…”

Assessment of School-Based Quasi-Experimental Nutrition and Food Safety Health Education for Primary School Students in Two Poverty-Stricken Counties of West China

“…Wall et al observed improved vegetable-related attitude, knowledge and self-efficacy of fourth grade students after a 4-lesson classroom-based nutrition education program [ 13 ]. Some studies indicated that health education alone was insufficient to change student’s practice patterns in short-term observations [ 14 – 16 ]. In China, studies of nutrition education for young children were rarely reported.…”

Commentary on Valdivieso Lopez et al. (2015): Lessons to be learnt from a randomized controlled trial of smoking prevention in secondary schools

“…Lopez et al ., the team of authors of the Catalan secondary schools smoking prevention programme, are to be commended for their innovative intervention and associated valuation in students across 29 participating schools with follow‐up over 4 years . The investigators summarize that their study could not claim any clear benefit for their school‐based intervention for reducing prevalence and incidents of smoking in 12–15‐year‐old students.…”