Athens University Medical School, Athens, Greece.
Ann Gen Psychiatry. 2011 Dec 23;10:33. doi: 10.1186/1744-859X-10-33.
Although the promotion of mental health (MHP) through education and training is widely accepted, there is scarce evidence for its effectiveness in the literature from outcome studies worldwide. The present study aimed to assess the effect of a three-semester MHP educational program on the recipients' opinions towards mental illness and on their own self-assessed health.
Respondents were 78 attendees who completed the assessment battery at the first (baseline) and the last session (end) of the training course. They were primary care physicians or other professionals, or key community agents, working in the greater Athens area. The course consisted of 44 sessions (4 h each), over a 3-semester period, focusing on the principles and methods of mental health promotion, the main aspects of major psychiatric disorders, and on relevant to health skills. Assessment instruments included the Opinion about Mental Illness (OMI) scale and the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28).
The mean scores of three OMI factors, that is, social discrimination, social restriction and social integration, and the two GHQ-28 subscales, that is, anxiety/insomnia and social dysfunction, were significantly improved by the end of the training course.
The results of this study provide evidence, with limitations, for the short-term effectiveness of the implemented educational MHP program on an adult group of recipients-key agents in their community. Because interventions for strengthening positive opinions about mental illness and enhancing self-assessed health constitute priority aims of mental health promotion, it would be beneficial to further investigate the sustainability of the observed positive changes. In addition it would be useful to examine (a) the possible interplay between the two outcome measures, that is, the effect of opinions of recipients about mental health on their perceived health, and (b) the applicability of this intervention in individuals with different sociodemographic profiles.
尽管通过教育和培训来促进心理健康（MHP）已被广泛接受，但从全球的结果研究文献中，几乎没有证据表明其有效性。本研究旨在评估一个三学期的 MHP 教育计划对接受者对精神疾病的看法以及他们自己对健康的自我评估的影响。
受访者为 78 名参加者，他们在培训课程的第一（基线）和最后一次（结束）评估电池中完成了评估。他们是在大雅典地区工作的初级保健医生或其他专业人员或关键社区代理。该课程由 44 个课程（每个 4 小时）组成，跨越三个学期，重点是心理健康促进的原则和方法、主要精神障碍的主要方面，以及与健康相关的技能。评估工具包括对精神疾病的看法（OMI）量表和一般健康问卷（GHQ-28）。
三个 OMI 因素的平均得分，即社会歧视、社会限制和社会融合，以及 GHQ-28 的两个分量表，即焦虑/失眠和社会功能障碍，在培训课程结束时显著提高。
这项研究的结果提供了证据，有一定的局限性，证明了在接受者社区关键代理的成年组中实施的教育 MHP 计划的短期有效性。因为加强对精神疾病的积极看法和增强自我评估健康的干预措施构成了心理健康促进的优先目标，因此进一步研究观察到的积极变化的可持续性将是有益的。此外，检查（a）两种结果衡量标准之间的可能相互作用，即接受者对精神健康的看法对他们感知健康的影响，以及（b）这种干预在具有不同社会人口统计学特征的个体中的适用性，将是有用的。
