E-Bug | AMR Education

Name of the activity: E-Bug | AMR Education

Country/NMO: Malta (MMSA)

Program: Communicable Diseases

Contact information: [email protected]

Type of the activity: Education. Education on health issues for specific societal groups, either in the form of projects (set of tasks for a certain group over a fixed period of time), events (something notable that happens) or conferences (form meeting about ideas related to a particular topic, usually over several days).

General description:

Our project focuses on educating 8-11 year old children and raising awareness about AMR and how it can be prevented. Over 150 children were reached via this project and each child recieved 3h of interactive sessions using the E-Bug.eu platform as well as classroom sessions to educate them on three main topics; microbes, hand & respiratory hygiene and antimicrobial resistance. When evaluation of this project was completed it was found that there was a 30% improvement on children’s overall knowledge of the topics discussed as well as an almost 50% average improvement on questions directly related to drug use and misuse. These results have led to the Malta Ministry of Education integrating this teaching into formal education in upper primary school curricula.

Focus area:

Reduce incidence of Antimicrobial Resistance

Problem statement:

AMR is a major public health issue which people lack interest in or are completely oblivious of. 10 million deaths per year will be due to AMR by 2050 this shows that as medical professionals we should have a strong voice on AMR. NICE guidance recommends educating children on AMR and this is an aspect which is lacking in malta since no formal education is provided on AMR. Therefore we felt a need to conduct a pilot project to push for its inclusion in national curricula.

Target groups:

Children, Youth

Beneficiaries:

General population, Medical students, Healthcare Students, Doctors, Other health professionals, Children, Youth

Objectives and indicators of success:

To carry out an educational project targeted at teaching 150 8-11y/o children at 3 “Skolasajf” summer school locations over the month of August about Antimicrobial Resistance and basic measures that can be effective in its prevention using new and innovative teaching methods while integrating the E-Bug.eu teaching platform into the sessions.

Indicators of success:

– A substantial improvement in students results from the pre evaluation to the post evaluation test.

– The number of children who indicate the use of the E-Bug.eu application at home.

– Positive feedback from the Medical Students carrying out each session.

Methodology:

A curriculum will be developed for 3 consecutive 1h sessions with each session focusing on a specific topic namely What is a Microbe, Hand & Respiratory Hygiene and Antimicrobial Resistance. The first two sessions should integrate the E-Bug.eu learning platform for 20 minutes of the session on e-learning tablets. This should be finalised a month prior to the commencement of the sessions and vetted by a representative from the ministry of health and the ministry of education.

150 8-11y/o children will receive the E-Bug session. 3 ‘Skolasajf’ locations will be targeted and 3 groups of 20 children at each school will be reached. Each receiving 3 sessions in total corresponding to the session plan that is issued, these sessions will take place over a period of 2 weeks in the end of August 2018.

Plans for evaluation:

A pre and post evaluation survey for the students should be set up to gauge the difference in their knowledge on AMR & related topics as well as the use of the E-Bug.eu application in their home. This evaluation tool should be vetted by the Ministry of Health. The results of this evaluation will be compiled into a final report on the project.

A team of 9 medical students will be equipped with the skills necessary to carry out the sessions by means of a toolkit and a short preparatory meeting prior to the commencement of the project. Their preparation will be evaluated by a feedback form to be filled in after each session given in order to gauge the session plans and the students response. The results of this evaluation will be compiled into a final report on the project.