General practitioners as educators in adolescent health: a training evaluation

Abstract

BackgroundGeneral practitioners play an important role in the primary care of adolescents in both community and clinical settings. Yet studies show that GPs can lack confidence, skills and knowledge in adolescent health. This study evaluates the effectiveness of an innovative training intervention on medical participants’ knowledge and confidence as adolescent health educators in a school setting.Methods15 general practitioners, 12 general practice registrars and 18 medical students participated in an adolescent health education workshop followed by field experience in health education sessions in secondary schools. The mixed method design included a pre and post intervention survey and focus group interviews.ResultsMean scores on the Confidence to Teach scale increased significantly (3.34 ± 0.51 to 4.09 ± 0.33) (p < .001) as did confidence to communicate with adolescents (3.64 ± 0.48 to 4.19 ± 0.33) (p < .001). Mean knowledge scores increased significantly (7.00 ± 1.22 to 8.98 ± 1.11) (p < .001). Participants highlighted the value of learning about adolescent health issues and generic teaching skills especially lesson planning and design, practicing experiential teaching strategies and finding the ‘sweet spot’ when communicating with adolescents. Some participants reported that these skills would transfer to the practice setting.ConclusionAn applied training intervention that uses evidence-based, experiential teaching strategies and focuses on developing knowledge and practical teaching skills appropriate for the health education of adolescents can enhance knowledge and confidence to engage in community-based adolescent health education.

Inicio del curso escolar durante la segunda ola de la COVID 19: una oportunidad para la salud comunitaria en las zonas básicas de salud de La Elipa y Daroca (Madrid)

“…Hasta donde conocemos, no hay estudios en España que hayan evaluado intervenciones para mejorar la información sobre adolescentes durante la pandemia de COVID-19, aunque sí se han publicado valiosas aportaciones en otros países 10 . En general, se ha sugerido que, a pesar de que no se suele poner en duda que la Atención Primaria desempeña un papel importante en la promoción de salud en la población adolescente, también se ha reportado que la escasez de actividades similares podría deberse a una falta de autoconfianza de sus profesionales para llevar a cabo este tipo de intervenciones 11 . Por ello, el entrenamiento en habilidades para implementar programas como este sería una etapa previa para incluir estas intervenciones entre las actividades programadas de los centros de salud.…”