[Child sexual abuse primary prevention: outcome evaluation of a health education project implemented in Milan's elementary schools].

The study we present is aimed at evaluating the efficacy of a child sexual abuse prevention program that involved children attending 4th and 5th grade in Milan's (Italy) elementary schools. The project involved 53 classes (10 of 4th, 43 of 5th grade) during school year 2000-2001. Children filled a questionnaire before the beginning of the project and two months after the end; the questionnaire evaluates children's perception of risk and their self-efficacy skills in adopting protective strategies when involved in at risk situations. Final analysis has involved 674 children, 51.8% girls, 48.2% boys; 19.6% of children attended 4th grade, 80.4% 5th grade. Percentage of children that recognize the potential danger in the suggested at-risk situation is higher in post-test then in pre-test (87.9% vs 73.2%) and the number of them that does not adopt any self-defence strategy decreases (from 35.3% to 21.0%). The project increased the number of children that know body puberal changes (from 16.0% to 32.8%). According to these results it is evident that the program increased children's capacity to recognize and use self defence strategies in at risk situations. These results call for a potential extention and replication of this health education program.