engleski

The Role of School Medicine Doctors in Health Education in Croatia – Past, Present and Future

Croatia never had a separate vocation (occupation) of a health educator. Health education is one of the main tasks in the long tradition of preventive work of doctors-school medicine specialists. Additionally, in the school curriculum in the Republic of Croatia the health-educational contents are integrated into various subjects, and are conducted by teachers. However, there are requests to introduce a new subject into schools called Health Education. This research was conducted among all the physicians of school medicine with the goal of querying their opinion on the introduction of the new subject. 30% of the physicians are dissatisfied with the current condition, 10% is satisfied, while there aren’t those who would declare themselves as very satisfied. They believe that health education goals are oriented solely to passing on knowledge (facts), while efforts are not done to change habits and attitudes of young people. They recognize themselves as persons mostly involved in health education in schools. 24% thinks that a special subject, i.e. Health Education should be introduced into schools, 17% is against, while 51% thinks that there should be contents integration and a separate subject. As carriers of the new subject, the doctors recommend themselves (44%), while a forth of the examinees thinks that a new vocation of a health educator should be developed. The conclusion states that, before introducing any changes into healthcare or education system, it is necessary to examine the attitudes of students and parents, to direct the changes towards the promotion of the cooperation between the healthcare system, education, civil society, school and community where investing into the health of young people is done through comprehensive and holistic programme

health education; school medicine; Croatia

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