Friendly Counselors for your Sexual Health

Name of the activity: Spanish: Cuidesex: Consejeros Amigables para su Salud Sexual. English: Cuidesex: Friendly Counselors for your Sexual Health

Country/NMO: Ecuador (AEMPPI-Ecuador)

Program: Realizing Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights

Contact information: [email protected] /Phone number: +593 992281596

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:

Capacitate medicine students about topics related to sexual and reproductive health to apply their understanding on their professional life and to eliminate the knowledge gap that exists about this subject at the faculties of medicine of our country.

Create, with the participants of the workshop, a group in charge of answering any question received by a Google form. Create a Facebook page called Cuidesex: Friendly Counselors for your Sexual Health to promote the Google form and to publish responses to the questions received. Anonymity is guaranteed to any user of this service.

38 first- and second-year medical students were capacitated, from them, 20 are working in an active way in this project, with LORA, LORA assistant, VPE and LORP. The answers are published every Thursday and Saturday at 8 PM. Consolidate the impact of the page through several strategies, the main one being to hire facebook advertising, and in this way achieve 1,500 followers until December 31, 2019.

Focus area:

Comprehensive Sexuality Education

Problem statement:

In Ecuador, talking about sexual health is still a taboo. Patients are getting aware of this issue; more than two-thirds of the patients feel uncomfortable when discussing their sexual concerns with their physician (Facio, et al., 2016).

The situation in the educational system is even worse. With this situation, the consequences are predictable and worrisome. According to INEC data from 2010, there were 122.301 teen moms in Ecuador. Therefore, it is necessary to improve sexual health education.

Target groups:

Other Students, Youth, Women

Beneficiaries:

General population, Medical students

Objectives and indicators of success:

– Train medical students on basic sexual health issues (contraception and STD’s) through a 4-hour workshop. Indicator: Train 35 medical students. Apply a questionnaire before and after the workshop.

– Form with trained students a group that will handle a platform of questions and answers in the social network Facebook. Indicator: Recruit at least 20 of the attendees to the Workshop to be part of the group. At the end of the year, apply a feedback survey to the group to identify strengths, weaknesses, and recommendations to improve the performance of the group next year.

– Create a platform on the Facebook social network to receive questions on sexual and reproductive health that guarantees anonymity to the participants. Indicator: Obtain at least 500 followers of the page and answer at least 100 questions from April 12, 2018, to December 15, 2018. Have a monthly growth of 10% in likes during that period of time.

– Increase the impact of the page so that it is a benchmark for consultation on sexual and reproductive health for adolescents, young people and the population in general, at a national level. Indicator: Achieve 1500 followers and/or likes until December 31, 2019.

Methodology:

A workshop was made on March 10, 2018. It discussed: sexual health clinical history, contraception and STD’s. Case-scenarios were proposed and solved. 38 students participated. Feedback form was completed by 27 of them. 26 decided to be part of the Facebook page project. This workshop will be replicated each year.

On April 12, 2018, a Google form was enabled to receive questions about sexual health from any user anonymously. It also collects brief epidemiologic data. This questionnaire is advertised on the Facebook page (Cuidesex). Questions are answered by members of the group. Responses are supervised by LORA, LORA assistant, VPE or LORP. Answer, with the original question, is posted by one of the supervisors on the Facebook page, without disclosing any epidemiologic data.

Page also publishes important information about sexual and reproductive health. In the future, we hope it is a benchmark for consultation at a national level. It will be promoted through various strategies.

Plans for evaluation:

Train 35 medical students in the Basic Principles of Sexual Health Workshop for Medical Students.

Recruit at least 20 participants of the Workshop previously mentioned, to be part of the group that will handle the platform of questions and answers throughout the year.

In relation to the social media that is used as a tool to receive and publish questions and answers about sexual and reproductive health, it is expected to get at least 500 followers of the Facebook page CUIDESEX: Friendly Counselors for your Sexual Health, with a growth of followers and/or likes of 10% per month. It is estimated to receive and respond at least 100 questions from April 12, 2018, to December 15, 2018.

To achieve that the page is of high impact, it is expected to obtain 1500 likes and/or followers until December 31, 2019.