Doroteya Velikova
National Center for Public Health & Analysis, Bulgaria
Title: The Implementation of the European framework for the Bulgarian system of school health promotion
Biography
Biography: Doroteya Velikova
Abstract
School health services improve health and education outcomes by providing young people in all education settings with health promotion and preventive health services. In Bulgaria, there are no quality standards in school health services. Creating a national framework for quality standards in school health services and competencies for school health professionals based on the European framework for quality standards in school health services is the goal of the presented study. Description of the problem: The national standards should support School health services managers and experts to develop and maintain quality services that meet children and adolescents‘ health needs and support institutions that train School health services professionals in developing specific curricula. The results: A study conducted in Bulgaria on health care proves the need to expand the national school health system based on European standards in school, especially as an important element of this system are the school health promotion professionals who are described in these standards. The task of this study is to understand what the activities of health professionals in school should be, what knowledge base they have and where they encounter difficulties in fulfilling their responsibilities. Lessons: The focus of the study is important for several reasons. First, it throws light on an occupational group and their absence from the official policy document that has been neglected within medical sociology. Second, if the research on the effectiveness of health promotion is to be translated into action, it is necessary to evaluate the organizational context where it can be used. The main goal is creating a framework for quality standards in school health services and competencies for school health professionals based on the European framework for quality standards in SHS. This includes an intersectional national normative framework of service delivery of School health services based on children‘s rights and priority public health concerns.