Innovative educational intervention for safe sexual and reproductive health

Background The increase in risky sexual behaviors among young people has sparked urgency and has become an area of interest for global public health researchers aiming to find innovative approaches to promote better sexual health. Sexual and reproductive health education is one of the objectives of EU Action Plan for Sexual and Reproductive Health dedicated to the need of establishing and strengthening formal and informal evidence-informed comprehensive sex education pointing to the development of competency training and aids for teachers, educators and health professionals. Many people feel less vulnerable to Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) based on their belief that they can ascertain whether a potential partner is likely to be infected or not on the basis of the way that they look or some other superficial characteristic. The challenge is to find the best way to tackle this problem and to ascertain what tools we could further develop to establish this. Digital educational interventions and serious games could be an effective sex education method as this generation is very familiar with this technology. Objectives The overall objective was to raise the knowledge and interest about sexual and reproductive health, enhancing best practices and educating opportunities, by involving scientists, teachers and other health promotion educators. More importantly, Safe4Play's goal was to directly address the misconceptions that young people have regarding sexual health risks (for example the sense of invulnerability to bad scenarios) and drive behavioural change in this area. Implementation The following activities were implemented as part of the Safe4Play project: 1. Developed the Safe4Play website: https://safe4play-project.eu/ 2. Established a Safe4Play Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ProjectSafe4Play 3. A Safe4Play video was produced to introduce the project. 4. Resources developed: IO 1 Desk Research on Sex Education IO 2 Curriculum with theoretical background on sex and reproductive health IO 3 Serious game for sex and reproductive health education 5. C1 Joint Staff Short-Term Training Event which took place in London 19th-21st April 2023 with 10 project staff. 6. In-Service training activity took place with local target groups in Greece, Northern Ireland, Belgium and Cyprus: - 44 front-line youth workers/organisational staff took part in the In-Service training of how to use the Safe4Play Serious Game and implement and intergrate it with young people. 7. Launch events was held in Greece, Northern Ireland, Belgium and Cyprus. A total of 169 participants attended. Participants included young people, youth workers, teachers, interested stakeholders. 8. 2 Safe4Play Newsletters were produced and disseminated. Achievements The project results were: O1 – Desk Research on Sex Education on all the disciplines related to influencing attitudes to sexual behaviour and risk, such as digital solutions for sex education, and counselling approaches in Sexual Health. O2 – Curriculum with theoretical background on sexual and reproductive health - The innovative curriculum has modular structured guidelines. O3 – Serious game with augmented reality (AR) features for sexual and reproductive health education - In the project serious games were developed including AR features for better understanding of the topic. In March 2022 the Rapid Review of Using Video Games to Improve the Sexual Health of Young People Aged 15 to 25 Years Chapter of IO 1 was published in the JMIR Serious Games journal. 44 front-line youth workers/organisational staff took part in the In-Service training of how to use the Safe4Play App and implement it with young people. 169 participants attended Launch Events in Northern Ireland, Cyprus, Belgium and Greece. Participants included young people, youth workers, teachers, interested stakeholders.