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Nurses, health staff to help improve health services in schools

Group discussions with school nurses and data collected from health authorities will determine health issues, behaviours, and the availability of capacities and resources in schools.

Nurses and health staff from 18 schools in the UAE will become part of a new pilot project aimed at improving health services provided by government secondary schools in the country. Telecom provider du has partnered with the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef), Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education and Abu Dhabi Health Services Company (Seha) ambulatory health services to launch the initiative.

Announcing health education for government schools. — Supplied photo

Group discussions with school nurses and data collected from health authorities will determine health issues, behaviours, and the availability of capacities and resources in schools. Based on this, a manual for the delivery of health education workshops, which will use a skills-based approach, will be developed.

The pilot project, which starts this month, will run for one year in 18 government secondary schools across the UAE — two in each emirate, Al Ain and Western Province.

Alongside the development of participatory teaching methods for health education topics, the programme will train school nurses to effectively apply this approach in the delivery of these sessions to students.

Unicef Gulf Area Representative, Dr Ibrahim El- Ziq, said: “Research has shown that an active participatory learning approach is the most effective method for developing knowledge and bringing about positive change. Through the School Health Education project we hope to educate as many secondary school children as we can on the benefits of adopting healthy lifestyles, which contributes to the overall strategy of the health and education authorities in the UAE.”

Dubai Medical District director, Nasser Khalifa Al Budoor, said: “Due to the close relationship between health and education, we always aspire to have people who are aware of the methods of protecting their health, preventing disease, practicing healthy behaviour.”

Schools in the UAE represent a quarter of the total population, and taking care of student health is a priority for the Ministry of Education. Aisha Alsiri, Director of Nutrition and School Health at the ministry, said: “One of the ministry’s goals is to promote activities which develop life skills for students in order to create a healthy generation of students.”

Hala Badri, Executive Vice President, Brand and Communications, du, commented: “We look forward to seeing our investment in the future of the UAE pay off, both in the short and long-term, which would result in a healthier future generation.”

muaz@khaleejtimes.com