The impact of training of peer educator on sexual and reproductive health: An interventional study

Abstract

Objectives: This study aims to reveal the knowledge and attitude change that a well-structured sexual and reproductive health (SRH) peer educator training creates in volunteer preclinical students from Marmara University School of Medicine. Materials and Methods: Participants (n=29) were given 28 hours of training on 13 subjects by professionals. Those who attended and completed all sessions were certified as “peer educator” (Group 1,n=12). Group 2 (n=17) participated only in the first 8 sessions. SRH attitudes and knowledge levels of participants were evaluated. Data was analysed in SPSS-11.0 programme. Results: Females constitute 51.7% of the participants. All participants had the similar level of “egalitarian” point of view (p:0.859). SRH final attitude score of Group 1 was higher than preliminary attitude score (p:0.008) and SRH final attitude score of Group 2 (p:0.033). The mean SRH knowledge score of Group 1 was 38.3±4.65, while that of Group 2 was 26.76±4.16 (p:0.0001). Conclusion: It has been shown that a well-structured peer educator training can increase the knowledge of volunteer medical students and make a positive attitude change. After the implementation of the “Health Transformation Programme” in Turkey, adolescents were ignored. So, with peer educator trainings, trained educators will be able to help those adolescents and offer unprejudiced and egalitarian services to their patients when they become physicians.