Effectiveness of the MHFA programme in a Nordic context: an intervention study among nurse professionals caring for older adults.

IF 2.1 3区医学 Q2 PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH

Scandinavian Journal of Public Health Pub Date : 2025-10-07 DOI:10.1177/14034948251380093

Magdalena Häger, Erika Boman, Anna K Forsman

{"title":"Effectiveness of the MHFA programme in a Nordic context: an intervention study among nurse professionals caring for older adults.","authors":"Magdalena Häger, Erika Boman, Anna K Forsman","doi":"10.1177/14034948251380093","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Aim: This study investigated the effects of the Mental Health First Aid-Elderly (MHFA-E) training programme on nurse professionals' mental health literacy; that is, confidence in helping and level of knowledge of mental ill health in older adults.Methods: An intervention study was conducted in the Åland Islands with 141 participants at baseline, all employed social and health care professionals in the study region. Surveys measuring perceived confidence in helping and acquired level of knowledge in mental ill health among older persons were administered before, immediately after, and 6 months following the training programme. Descriptive statistics and effect sizes (Cohen's d) were used to analyse outcome differences within the participants over time.Results: Significant improvements in confidence in helping and level of knowledge were found among the programme participants post intervention compared with baseline. However, a decline was registered at 6 months post intervention compared with immediately after the training programme. The findings highlight that the MHFA-E training programme carries potential in enhancing mental health literacy among nurse professionals.Conclusions: This is one of few studies evaluating the MHFA-E programme. As the results are promising, this programme may provide a feasible intervention to strengthen the mental health literacy among care professionals in caring for older adults. However, as for emergency first aid courses, the results indicate no prolonged effects, suggesting that the studied MHFA-E programme needs to be delivered regularly in order to maintain its effect. More large-scale intervention studies evaluating this MHFA-E programme format in the Nordic context are warranted.","PeriodicalId":49568,"journal":{"name":"Scandinavian Journal of Public Health","volume":" ","pages":"14034948251380093"},"PeriodicalIF":2.1000,"publicationDate":"2025-10-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Scandinavian Journal of Public Health","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14034948251380093","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH","Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Abstract

Aim: This study investigated the effects of the Mental Health First Aid-Elderly (MHFA-E) training programme on nurse professionals' mental health literacy; that is, confidence in helping and level of knowledge of mental ill health in older adults.

Methods: An intervention study was conducted in the Åland Islands with 141 participants at baseline, all employed social and health care professionals in the study region. Surveys measuring perceived confidence in helping and acquired level of knowledge in mental ill health among older persons were administered before, immediately after, and 6 months following the training programme. Descriptive statistics and effect sizes (Cohen's d) were used to analyse outcome differences within the participants over time.

Results: Significant improvements in confidence in helping and level of knowledge were found among the programme participants post intervention compared with baseline. However, a decline was registered at 6 months post intervention compared with immediately after the training programme. The findings highlight that the MHFA-E training programme carries potential in enhancing mental health literacy among nurse professionals.

Conclusions: This is one of few studies evaluating the MHFA-E programme. As the results are promising, this programme may provide a feasible intervention to strengthen the mental health literacy among care professionals in caring for older adults. However, as for emergency first aid courses, the results indicate no prolonged effects, suggesting that the studied MHFA-E programme needs to be delivered regularly in order to maintain its effect. More large-scale intervention studies evaluating this MHFA-E programme format in the Nordic context are warranted.

查看原文本刊更多论文

在北欧背景下MHFA项目的有效性：一项对护理老年人的专业护士的干预研究。

目的：探讨老年人心理健康急救（MHFA-E）培训项目对护理专业人员心理健康素养的影响；也就是说，帮助老年人的信心和对精神疾病的了解程度。方法：在Åland群岛进行了一项干预研究，141名参与者在基线时均在研究地区雇用社会和卫生保健专业人员。在培训方案之前、之后和之后6个月进行了调查，测量老年人在帮助心理疾病方面的感知信心和获得的知识水平。描述性统计和效应量（Cohen’s d）用于分析参与者之间随时间的结果差异。结果：与基线相比，干预后项目参与者在帮助和知识水平方面的信心有了显著提高。然而，在干预后6个月，与培训计划后立即相比，出现了下降。研究结果强调，MHFA-E培训方案在提高护士专业人员的心理健康素养方面具有潜力。结论：这是少数评估MHFA-E计划的研究之一。由于结果很有希望，该方案可以提供一种可行的干预措施，以加强照顾老年人的护理专业人员的心理健康素养。然而，关于紧急急救课程，结果表明没有持久的效果，这表明所研究的MHFA-E方案需要定期提供，以保持其效果。有必要进行更多的大规模干预研究，在北欧背景下评估这种MHFA-E方案格式。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

Scandinavian Journal of Public Health 医学-公共卫生、环境卫生与职业卫生

CiteScore

6.50

自引率

2.90%

发文量

135

审稿时长

4-8 weeks

期刊介绍： The Scandinavian Journal of Public Health is an international peer-reviewed journal which has a vision to: publish public health research of good quality; contribute to the conceptual and methodological development of public health; contribute to global health issues; contribute to news and overviews of public health developments and health policy developments in the Nordic countries; reflect the multidisciplinarity of public health.