How important is first aid for teenagers?

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Mental health first aid training was originally developed to enable adults to help other adults. However, mental disorders often appear for the first time in adolescence. Teenagers need the help from adults to identify the disorder, to provide appropriate support and to seek professional help. 

First aid training gives teachers the knowledge to help their students with mental disorders and also can normalize treatments and make them more completed, first aid knowledge especially in mental health reduces stigma in some areas and increases confidence to help students and peers. 

However, to appreciate young people’s presence and value their safety, another way to reduce risky behaviour is to motivate them to proactively ask for help to prevent harm. 

Actually research shows that adolescents are more willing to help and intervene with their peers and use a variety of strategies to do so. Smart and Stoduto’s study states that, “about one-third of their sample of adolescents received interventions to prevent their friends from using alcohol and other substances,” and these adolescents were more likely to abstain, be stricter, not accept drugs, and make friends. First aid and CPR training provided to students at school gives them the opportunity to increase their health and safety knowledge regarding injuries and cardiac arrest as well as knowledge of mental illness.

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