[Health education in schools for adults: by a teacher or health education lecture?].
OBJECTIVE
To compare the results of two ways of teaching the rational use of medicines to students of centres of permanent education of adults (CPEA): one taught by the normal teachers (after training by health personnel) and one through a lecture given by the health staff.


METHODS
Intervention study without randomised distribution and with a control group.


METHODS
Five CPEA in an urban centre.


METHODS
385 students and 15 CPEA teachers.


METHODS
Three groups: a) "teachers" group: consisting of students who received education on medicines in the class-room through their teachers, who had been previously trained by health personnel; b) "lecture" group: students who had received a health education lecture on medicines given by health staff; c) non-intervention group. All three groups were administered a questionnaire before and after the intervention. Both questionnaires were paired.


RESULTS
248 people completed the first questionnaire and 149 the second. Significant gains in knowledge were only found in the teachers intervention group (p < 0.01; 7.8% increase in score). Dividing the students into terciles made these gains significantly greater (11.7%) in the students of the teachers group who in the first questionnaire had intermediate scores than in the students in the other groups who had intermediate scores.


CONCLUSIONS
Intervention with teachers seems more effective than either a health education lecture or no intervention, especially in the improvement in knowledge of students who already had beforehand intermediate knowledge.
Tormo Molina
J
J
Centro de Salud Salvador Caballero, Escuela Andaluza de Salud Pública, Granada. tormo@samfyc.es
Rodríguez Fernández
M J
MJ
Hernán García
M
M
Fernández Ajuria
A
A
García-Marcos
A
A
D000328:Adult; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D005260:Female; D006266:Health Education; D006282:Health Personnel; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011320:Primary Health Care; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013663:Teaching