Health care students at an Argentinean school of medicine: are they well prepared to provide quality sexual and reproductive health services?

Are sexual and reproductive health and rights taught in medical school? Results from a global survey

Our aim was to investigate the inclusion of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) topics in medical curricula and the perceived need for, feasibility of, and barriers to teaching SRHR. We distributed a survey with questions on SRHR content, and factors regulating SRHR content, to medical universities worldwide using chain referral. Associations between high SRHR content and independent variables were analyzed using unconditional linear regression or χ² test. Text data were analyzed by thematic analysis. We collected data from 219 respondents, 143 universities and 54 countries. Clinical SRHR topics such as safe pregnancy and childbirth (95.7%) and contraceptive methods (97.2%) were more frequently reported as taught compared with complex SRHR topics such as sexual violence (63.8%), unsafe abortion (65.7%), and the vulnerability of LGBTQIA persons (23.2%). High SRHR content was associated with high-income level (P = 0.003) and low abortion restriction (P = 0.042) but varied within settings. Most respondents described teaching SRHR as essential to the health of society. Complexity was cited as a barrier, as were cultural taboos, lack of stakeholder recognition, and dependency on fees and ranking.

Contents of the Sexual and Reproductive Health Subject in the Undergraduate Nursing Curricula of Spanish Universities: A Cross-Sectional Study

Background: Nursing students must receive adequate training in Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH), which could allow them to acquire sufficient knowledge to solve the future SRH needs of everyone. In this study, the contents of the SRH subject in the undergraduate nursing curricula of 77 Spanish universities were examined to determine what SRH training nursing students are receiving. Methods: The contents of the SRH subject of all the curricula that were available online were reviewed. The distribution of the contents (topics) in the two areas (reproductive health and sexual health) was analyzed, and the prevalence of each topic was established. It was also determined whether there were differences between public (n = 52) and private universities (n = 25). Results: The training of nursing students focuses mainly on the area of Reproductive Health (15 topics). Most of the topics of this area had a prevalence greater than 50%. Although the area of Sexual Health had 14 topics, most of these topics had a low prevalence (<20%), especially in private universities. Conclusions: It was found that there is considerable variation in the distribution and prevalence of SRH topics between universities. The contents of the area of Reproductive Health are usually prevalent in most of the curricula. However, the contents of the area of Sexual Health are minimal in most of the universities. An organizational effort is required to determine and standardize the contents of SRH that nursing students should receive in Spain to avoid inequalities in their training. Guaranteeing homogeneous SRH contents will avoid deficit situations that could affect people’s care.

Sexual health knowledge and influencing factors among health science students at a state university in Turkey

OBJECTIVES

It is important to determine the sexual health knowledge and educational needs of university health science students, as they need this knowledge in both their personal and professional lives. We aimed to determine the sexual health knowledge and affecting factors of health science students in Turkey.

METHODS

A descriptive study was carried out among students at a university faculty of health sciences in Ankara province, Turkey. Data were collected using a student information form and the Sexual Health Knowledge Test (SHKT).

RESULTS

The study comprised 738 participants. Students' mean SHKT score was moderate (25.13 ± 5.28; range 0-40). The lowest correct response rates in the SHKT were to questions on sexually transmitted infections (45.6%) and safe sexual behaviour (53.5%). Students' main sources of information on sexual health were the internet (72%) and friends (40.9%). The most important factors affecting SHKT scores were having graduated from a health-education high school (eta² = 0.035); having a working mother (eta² = 0.023); getting sexual health information from the internet (eta² = 0.019), from friends (eta² = 0.018) or from school/teachers (eta² = 0.015); having friends of the opposite sex for emotional and/or social support (eta² = 0.010); and being female (eta² = 0.008).

CONCLUSION

The results indicate the importance of educating young people and their parents about sexual health. We recommend that the sexual health educational needs of university students in health sciences should not be overlooked; these students have similar needs to those of students in other fields.