Risks and success conditions for the French sanitary service of health students
Résumé
Abstract Background French sanitary service of health students was a pledge of the French Presidency. It is mainly presented as a massive information campaign on good practices in health made by “thousands of health students going into the enterprises and schools”. We tried to skip this orientation and to go to actions in favor of people’s empowerment and ability in health choices. Objectives Our program was designed to change students’ ideas on prevention, by focusing on reflexivity, motivational approaches, education and ethic in health promotion, of peer-to-peer effects and concrete use of educational tools for teen-agers groups. We developed students’ autonomy and ability to negotiate their project with the prevention structures. Training was 11 workshops (2 hours each), of 15 to 20 students (mixing medical, pharmaceutical, dental and midwives), and e-learning. Then they had 5 months to negotiate with their place of intervention (secondary schools and apprenticeship centers) and create their own new project. Intervention lasted for one week, full time, in various teen-agers settings, so that to reduce social and territorial inequities in health. Results After a first test (28 students in 6 settings), 250 students acted in 72 teen-agers’ facilities. Problem occurs in 1 case (lack of negotiation and preparation before the intervention) and satisfaction of both students and facilities are high. At the same times, we had to face constraints due to double bind policies of the state authorities (i.e. as asking for more training time and reducing training financing, asking to send students in deprived or isolated areas and reimbursing scarcely the costs). Conclusions An educational program on training and students’ autonomy works if we take care on five points: learning of educational process in health, control of peer-to-peer effects, reduction of health inequities, and reinforcement of local health promotion policies. This also needs state policies that are ready to play the game. Key messages Training of health students to develop their autonomy and ability in health education works. Inconsistency in State policies is the major problem.