Public Health topic: Strengthening the mental health of children and young people

Topic details

On the topic of mental health, the participants focused on the areas of school absenteeism and trauma experiences in childhood. For example, findings on risk and protective factors of truancy, warning signs of childhood trauma experiences or influences of childhood trauma experiences on physical and mental health in adulthood were discussed.

In the meetings with representatives of the public health service, the following questions were defined that are divided into two work packages:

1) Knowledge collection - evidence synthesis

1.1) What evidence is there on risk and protective factors of truancy?

1.2) What is the evidence on trauma experiences in childhood and health development in adulthood?

1.3) How can trauma experiences already manifest themselves in childhood?

1.4) What are the warning signs of child trauma experiences?

1.5) How can professionals be sensitised to recognise warning signs regarding child trauma experiences in time?

1.6) Which structural services are useful to support children, adolescents and their parents with psychological problems?

2) Evidence from population studies - new analyses and/or compilation of already published results

2.1) What influence do trauma experiences (retrospective questionnaire) from the past have on physical and mental health?

2.2) Can evidence on trauma experiences and health be generated from the SNIP birth cohort (SNIP= Survey of Neonates in Pomerania)?

2.3) Can evidence on risk and protective factors of school absenteeism be generated from the SNIP birth cohort?

In the next three months, the tasks developed on the topic will be worked on together with representatives from science, public health services and other interested parties. The results will be communicated publicly via the platform and discussed with the public health service in a second virtual event block.

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