Long Jeanne L, Haver Jacquelyn, Mendoza Pamela, Vargas Kotasek Selvia M
Department of Education and Child Protection, Save the Children, Washington, DC, United States.
Programs, Save the Children, Mexico City, Mexico.
Front Glob Womens Health. 2022 Apr 14;3:859797. doi: 10.3389/fgwh.2022.859797. eCollection 2022.
Improving the menstrual health literacy of girls and boys is a key strategy within a holistic framework of Save the Children's school health and comprehensive sexuality education programming. As menstrual health is an emerging area of study and programming, Save the Children continues to learn and adjust its interventions using program evaluations and rigorous monitoring. This paper will examine program-monitoring data from three cohorts, representing 47 public schools in Mexico City, Puebla, and Mérida, Mexico. The study focuses on female students in 5th and 6th grade who participated in We See Equal, a school-based program centered on gender equality and puberty education, between September 2018 and December 2019. This study used a cross-sectional quantitative cohort approach to document changes in girls' experiences and perceptions around managing menstruation in school. The analysis compares girls' knowledge and experiences before and after participation in We See Equal to understand how knowledge changes over the program and how those changes may contribute to menstruation-related school engagement, stress, and self-efficacy (MENSES) outcomes. Multivariate regression models explored relationships between MENSES outcomes, knowledge and socioeconomic status (SES). Overall, results show that the more knowledge girls acquired, the higher their self-efficacy score and the lower their stress score, however, certain MHH knowledge was more predictive of MENSES outcomes and varied by SES. Among girls from lower SES, we observed significant relationships between knowing what their period was prior to menarche and the three MENSES outcomes. Decreases in menstruation-related stress were driven by items related to the practical knowledge of how to dispose of sanitary pads and reduced feelings of nervousness on days they had their period at school. Increases in self-efficacy were primarily driven by girls' confidence in their ability to track their period from month to month, feelings that they could still do well on an exam if they had their period at school, and security that they could ask a friend to lend them a pad if they needed one. Implications for future menstrual health literacy programming and targeting populations for menstrual health education, as well as priorities for future research will be discussed.
提高女孩和男孩的月经健康素养是救助儿童会学校健康与全面性教育项目整体框架中的一项关键策略。由于月经健康是一个新兴的研究和项目领域，救助儿童会继续通过项目评估和严格监测来学习并调整其干预措施。本文将研究来自三个队列的项目监测数据，这些数据代表了墨西哥城、普埃布拉和梅里达的47所公立学校。该研究聚焦于2018年9月至2019年12月期间参加了“我们追求平等”项目的五、六年级女生，这是一个以性别平等和青春期教育为核心的校本项目。本研究采用横断面定量队列研究方法，记录女孩在学校管理月经方面的经历和认知变化。分析比较了女孩在参加“我们追求平等”项目前后的知识和经历，以了解知识在项目过程中的变化情况，以及这些变化如何影响与月经相关的学校参与度、压力和自我效能感（MENSES）结果。多元回归模型探讨了MENSES结果、知识与社会经济地位（SES）之间的关系。总体而言，结果表明女孩获得的知识越多，自我效能感得分越高，压力得分越低，然而，某些月经健康知识对MENSES结果的预测性更强，且因社会经济地位而异。在社会经济地位较低的女孩中，我们观察到初潮前了解自己月经情况与三个MENSES结果之间存在显著关系。与月经相关的压力减轻是由与如何处理卫生巾的实用知识以及在学校经期时紧张感降低相关的项目推动的。自我效能感的提高主要是由女孩对逐月追踪月经周期能力的信心、她们认为即使在学校经期时考试仍能考好的感觉，以及她们在需要时可以向朋友借卫生巾的安全感所驱动的。将讨论对未来月经健康素养项目、月经健康教育目标人群的启示，以及未来研究的重点。
