title: Are school-based mental health interventions for war-affected children effective and harmless?
abstract: In recent years, different approaches to large-scale mental health service provision for children in war-affected, mainly low- and middle-income, countries have been developed. Some school-based programs aiming at both strengthening resilience and reducing symptoms of trauma-related distress have been evaluated. In an article published in BMC Medicine, Tol and colleagues integrate their findings of the efficacy of universal school-based intervention across four countries and do not recommend classroom-based intervention as a treatment of trauma-related symptoms, since no consistent positive effects were found. On the contrary, for some children this type of universal intervention may impair recovery. Since universal school-based programs similar to the one evaluated here are widely implemented, Tol et al.'s results are highly relevant to inform the field of mental health service provision in war-affected countries.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, Bielefeld University, Post BOX: 100131, 33501 Bielefeld, Germany. verena.ertl@uni-bielefeld.de.
authors.forename: Verena
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Ertl
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Neuner
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male