None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
The teen Mental Health First Aid program for students in Year 7-9 (tMHFA7-9) teaches students aged 12-15 years how to: - recognise warning signs that a friend is developing a mental health problem - understand how to talk to a friend about mental health and seeking help - when and how to tell a responsible adult - where to find appropriate and helpful resources about mental illness and professional help - how to respond in a crisis situation The course was previously evaluated in an uncontrolled trial with year 8 students. As a result of the research findings a revised edition of the tMHFA 7-9 was developed in 2020 and is being piloted with year 8 students in two Western Australian secondary schools in 2021. The aim of this project is to provide evidence on the effectiveness of the tMHFA 7-9 Edition 3 course in a parallel randomised controlled trial with year 8 students, using the Red Cross "Let's Talk First Aid" course for Year 8 (LTFA) as the comparator.
Interventions
teen Mental Health First Aid
The teen Mental Health First Aid (tMHFA) 7-9 Edition 3 is a redesigned course of MHFA Australia for students in Years 7-9 that has been developed with input from multiple curriculum specialists and student focus groups. tMHFA builds on the familiar first aid model and teaches students an easy to use and remember 5-step action plan for helping a friend with a mental health problem.
The tMHFA program is designed to develop students’ knowledge and skills in:
- recogni
teen Mental Health First Aid The teen Mental Health First Aid (tMHFA) 7-9 Edition 3 is a redesigned course of MHFA Australia for students in Years 7-9 that has been developed with input from multiple curriculum specialists and student focus groups. tMHFA builds on the familiar first aid model and teaches students an easy to use and remember 5-step action plan for helping a friend with a mental health problem. The tMHFA program is designed to develop students’ knowledge and skills in: - recognising warning signs that a friend is developing a mental health problem; - understanding how to talk to a friend about mental health and seeking help; - when and how to tell a responsible adult; - where to find appropriate and helpful resources about mental illness and professional help; and - how to respond in a crisis situation. tMHFA has been designed by experts in MHFA training and youth mental health. tMHFA contains a multimedia presentation, videos, a workbook and learning activities. The program is presented by Accredited MHFA Instructors who have specialist knowledge in youth mental health and experience working within schools. tMHFA involves delivery of 4 x 50-minute sessions. For this trial, tMHFA will be delivered to Year 8 students in regular school classes, in groups of 20-30 students, once a week, over a four week period. Class attendance will be taken by supervising teachers and provided to researchers according to Unique student ID to maintain anonymity.
Sponsors
University of Melbourne
Study design
Allocation
Randomised controlled trial
Intervention model
Parallel
Primary purpose
Educational / counselling / training
Masking
Blinded (masking used) (Investigator)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
12 Years to 15 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
Schools to be included in the trial must be public high schools located in greater Perth Western Australia and have at least 10% of staff with Youth Mental Health First Aid accreditation. Schools must not have received any mental health first aid training for students in their current Year 8 cohort. All Year 8 students from host schools will be eligible to participate.
Exclusion criteria
Schools that do not have least 10% of staff with Youth Mental Health First Aid accreditation. Schools with year 8 cohorts of less than 160 students to ensure maintenance of participation at 12 month follow-up. Schools with an ICSEA of more or less than 1 standard deviation than the mean (of the list of those eligible) to try to limit variability between randomised pairs. tMHFA is not designed as a suicide postvention program. If a recent suicide has occurred in a school, the appropriateness of running the tMHFA program will be assessed before formally recruiting the school.
Outcome results
None listed