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Depression and anxiety are common mental health issues among young adults, particularly exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Research indicates a notable increase in global prevalence rates, especially in this demographic. Despite their prevalence, factors like stigma, cost and limited accessibility often prevent individuals from seeking professional help. Therefore, there is a pressing need for innovative and accessible interventions to address these challenges. help. Therefore, there is a pressing need for innovative and accessible interventions to address these challenges. This study aims to assess the feasibility and acceptability of newly developed “AKBAY” self-help intervention workbook among university students in managing the symptoms of depression and anxiety.

Using a pilot study with a single-group design. A total of 33 university students voluntarily participated in the study. The primary outcomes, depressive symptoms and anxiety were measured using the PHQ-9 and GAD-7, respectively, at both pre-intervention and post-intervention (eight weeks following the preintervention assessment).

Results from Wilcoxon signed rank revealed significant reductions in both depression and anxiety symptoms following the intervention. Qualitative feedback from participants highlighted the perceived benefits of the intervention, including increased self-awareness, improved coping strategies and personal growth. All participants expressed intent to recommend the intervention to others.

However, further research using larger sample sizes, randomized controlled trials and long-term follow-up assessments is warranted to validate these findings and enhance intervention effectiveness.

These findings highlight the potential feasibility and acceptability of self-help interventions in reducing and preventing the worsening of symptoms of depression and anxiety among Filipino young adults.

The “AKBAY” intervention presents a feasible and accessible approach to reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety of Filipino young adults as well as the program’s potential usefulness. The findings of this study can serve as a foundation for a randomized controlled trial of the AKBAY self-help intervention.

This study aims to evaluate the delivery of a virtual community-based mental health and substance use program for Filipino drug users during the COVID-19 pandemic.

It used a randomized control longitudinal design with data collected prior to the program and every two months for 10 months. The programs focused on building recovery skills, life skills and family modules. Program length ranged from a brief intervention of three sessions to 24 sessions depending on whether clients were low risk, moderate risk or those arrested for drug use.

Results revealed significant improvements in recovery skills of participants in the treatment group compared to those in the control group. Mental health illness symptoms decreased for both control and treatment groups; however, no differences were found in recovery capital and cravings.

The lack of significant changes in certain variables, such as recovery capital, requires more data to understand the barriers to enable greater recovery. The study was limited to virtual delivery of rehabilitation services conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Future studies may wish to compare modalities of online and onsite delivery to enable a comparison of effectiveness.

Results suggest the feasibility of virtual delivery of mental health and substance use treatment implemented by trained paraprofessionals. However, it also highlights the necessity to build the capacity of service providers and address connectivity challenges.

Stigma and discrimination prevent people who use drugs from seeking treatment. Virtual delivery of mental health and substance use treatment can provide a platform where people can seek help while maintaining some privacy.

The study provides evidence from under-represented populations – persons who use drugs in the Philippines.

This study investigates the effect of education on crop insurance knowledge within the context of noncompliance experiences. In addition, the study delves into the role of government endorsement in education, which is instructive for the implementation of future insurance promotions.

The study designs a randomized controlled trial (RCT) conducted in Jiangsu Province, China. A total of 518 sample farmers were randomly assigned to two experiments: The Education Experiment and the government’s Endorsement Experiment, respectively. After conducting a set of rigorous exogeneity tests, econometric analysis was conducted using baseline survey data and post experiment data.

Our results revealed that insurance education served as an effective tool in improving farmers’ insurance knowledge, especially their understanding of insurance mechanisms. However, this effect can be mitigated by the noncompliant insurance experience of farmers. Moreover, government-endorsed education proved to be more efficient in improving farmers’ insurance knowledge, thus highlighting the significance of building trust between insureds and insurers.

This study contributes to the literature by demonstrating that using a simple education tool, such as, brochures, can effectively improve farmers insurance knowledge. In addition, insurance mechanisms are now more urgently in need of universalization than policy information. Furthermore, by conducting the RCT, this study obtains unbiased causal inference on the effect of education on insurance knowledge and underscores the role of government endorsement in this process. In addition, the study illustrates the tradeoff between insurers’ efforts in enhancing education and regulating noncompliant insurance misconducts, which compromises education efforts. Overall, this study provides insights into the marketing strategies of insurers and government propaganda aimed at stimulating farmers’ incentives to purchase insurance.

We examined the impact of a leadership support training intervention implemented prior to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic on support behaviors specific to COVID-19 during the pandemic. Primary intervention targets (i.e. family-supportive supervisor behaviors and sleep leadership behaviors) were explored as mediators between the intervention and supportive COVID-19 leadership behaviors.

A cluster randomized controlled trial intervention was implemented with service members and their supervisors in the Army and Air National Guard throughout 2017–2019. Follow-up survey data were collected after the intervention, including during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Direct and indirect intervention effects were tested.

A pre-COVID intervention targeting leader support for family and sleep health had a direct effect on leader support specific to the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, sleep leadership, but not family-supportive supervisor behaviors, mediated the intervention effects on supportive COVID-19 leadership. These findings suggest that certain leadership training interventions can transfer across knowledge domains and time.

Findings from this study demonstrate that training leaders on support behaviors improves their ability to support employees during the COVID-19 pandemic and may translate to crisis leadership in other contexts.

We examined the long-term effects of an intervention that was implemented approximately 1–2 years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic on leadership support behaviors specific to the pandemic. Our findings contribute to the leadership, training, and organizational intervention literatures, and have implications for how leaders can support employees during crises.

This study aims to characterize the experiences of health professionals participating in an exploratory randomized controlled trial designed to improve hearing and vision among older adults without dementia receiving the in-home health services provided by Norwegian municipalities.

Semistructured individual and paired interviews were conducted by nine health professionals from five municipalities to explore health professionals’ experiences with the intervention. The data were analyzed using content analysis.

Three main categories of experiences were identified: (1) participating in the intervention, (2) emerging new knowledge and (3) developing in-home health services. The mutual collaboration between health professionals and service recipients during the screening process led to a more-thorough understanding of the service recipients’ needs and resources, enabling personalized advice and guidance.

In-home interventions have the potential to improve the quality of life of older adults with hearing and vision impairments. Given the promising outcomes of such interventions, future research should (1) investigate their effects on changes in behaviors and attitudes, (2) integrate technological advancements and (3) explore environmental modifications to further enhance the quality of life of older adults in various settings.

The health professionals in this study enjoyed assisting the service recipients in receiving in-home health services by screening their hearing, vision and indoor lighting conditions. The trial enabled the health professionals to provide personalized advice, and to motivate and guide the service recipients toward actions to remedy their impairments.

The health professionals recommended hearing, vision and indoor lighting screening to be a routine municipal service because it would safeguard independence, prevent falling and maintain the quality of life of service recipients. However, additional resources are needed to implement these recommendations.

In-home interventions have the potential to improve the quality of life of older adults with hearing and vision impairments.

This paper examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on low-carbon consumption of dairy products through informational interventions. The empirical findings seek to enlighten developing countries' efforts in coping with climate change and potential dietary transitions.

A randomized controlled trial was designed to examine the effects of purpose-differentiated information interventions on individual dairy consumption. The experiment recruited and randomly assigned 1,002 college students into four groups to receive (or not) environmental or/and health information interventions.

The empirical analysis finds that health and combined information interventions have a positive impact on dairy consumption, while environmental information interventions' effect on dairy consumption is insignificant. In the context of the pandemic, health information interventions positively affected participants' perceptions and preferences for dairy products by delivering knowledge about their role in boosting immunity. However, environmental information interventions failed to do the same things as their insignificant effects on both perception and preference.

Macro-external shocks, such as public health events, may offset the impact of universal information interventions promoting pro-environmental behaviors. For a smooth dietary transition to achieve long-term environmental sustainability, diverse stakeholders must be included in more individualized interventions to guide daily consumption, especially in developing countries with large populations.

There is evidence that both hypnotherapy and virtual reality (VR) can be helpful in reducing perceived stress in the general population. This is a feasibility and acceptability trial of an intervention combining hypnotherapy and VR to establish its acceptability in students. This study aims to establish whether students found the experience acceptable, described any adverse effects and whether they reported feeling calmer after the experience.

The study was testing the hypothesis that students would attend the sessions and find the experience acceptable. A secondary hypothesis was that preliminary qualitative and quantitative evaluation of measures of stress and wellbeing would signal potential improvements.

All participants completed all three sessions. No side effects were reported. Visual analogue scales recorded each day assessing the immediate effect improved. At the end of the intervention, there was an increase in wellbeing of 2.40 (95% CI: 1.33, 3.53, p = 0.006), and a decrease in depression of 0.73 (95% CI: 0.40, 1.07, p = 0.010), reflecting large effect sizes of 0.76 and 0.83, respectively. Qualitative feedback was generally very positive.

This study is small with just 15 students and was over a short period of time. The recruitment method meant there was no way to establish whether the volunteer students were representative of the general student population in terms of mental wellbeing. There was no control arm.

The preliminary results suggest that a larger controlled trial is justified.

This VR experience may have benefit to university students and to the wider population.

This described the evaluation of a novel intervention for perceived stress combining hypnotherapy and virtual reality in a group of healthcare students, with promising results suggesting further evaluation is needed.

Our objective was to evaluate the cost-utility of a health and social care integration programme for frail older adults in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Based on a study of the programme’s effectiveness, a Markov model was conducted to assess its cost-utility. The active intervention was the health and social care integration programme, and the control was the best standard of care so far. The setting was the patients' home of residence. A third-party payer perspective and a lifelong time horizon were adopted. All transition probabilities, quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) and costs were estimated from the effectiveness study. A discount rate of 3.5% was applied to costs and benefits. Costs are expressed in international dollars (Int$), calculated according to the International Monetary Fund’s purchasing power parity rate. Different sensitivity analyses were performed. The model was built in Excel 365. Construct validity, verification during model construction and internal consistency of the results were assessed.

The programme had an average cost of Int$18,768.22/QALY, and the control Int$42,609.68/QALY. In the incremental analysis, the programme saved Int$26,436.10 and gained 0.81 QALYs over the control. In the sensitivity analyses, in 99.96% of cases, the programme was less costly and more effective.

The cost savings can facilitate the scalability.

The health and social care integration programme for frail older adults was more effective and less costly than the best standard of care to date. This study contributes to the scarce evidence on the efficiency of integrated care strategies for frail older persons.

This paper aims to evaluate the impact of the “Postliteracy” program on the qualification of beneficiaries for socioeconomic integration. This qualification is achieved first through the consolidation of the achievements of individuals freed from illiteracy, and then through their support in creating income-generating activities by providing them with technical, economic, legal and institutional knowledge to ensure their conscious and responsible participation in local and regional development efforts.

To evaluate the impact of the “Postliteracy” program, this paper uses quasi-experimental methods with a control group (participants of the “Literacy” program 2020 / 2021) and a treatment group (participants of the “Postliteracy” program 2021 / 2022). Skill acquisition is measured through pretest and posttest evaluations using a questionnaire aligned with the National Agency for the Fight Against Illiteracy (ANLCA)-adopted curriculum. The survey occurred at the beginning and at the end of the program, providing sufficient time for skill development. The questionnaire includes three sections covering socioprofessional characteristics, technical and economic domains and legal and institutional aspects. These sections contribute to a score reflecting the acquired skills for successful socioeconomic integration.

The results of the study demonstrate that the “Postliteracy” program has a positive impact on the acquisition of competences necessary for improved socioeconomic integration of the beneficiaries. The various matching techniques reveal a score difference ranging from 12 to 14 points in favor of program participants compared to those who did not participate. The Difference-in-Differences method confirms the positive and significant impact of the program.

The findings highlight the importance of the “Postliteracy” program in national literacy policy, underlining the need to further strengthen its presence within the programs deployed by ANLCA, notably by increasing the number of beneficiaries targeted by this program. To achieve this, it would be advisable to increase the funds allocated to it within ANLCA's budget.

The originality of this work is a unique research of the case of Morocco based on a microeconometric study for which the authors evaluate the impact of adult education by applying impact evaluation methods in the field of adult literacy.

This paper aims to carry out a systematic review based on the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) guidelines to assess the adherence to the Mediterranean dietary pattern (MDP) in workers.

Three electronic databases were searched up to March 2022. The population was restricted to adults, workers in any professional area, without special diets and no specific health conditions. Their adherence to the MDP was assessed by any a priori method/instrument. Two reviewers independently applied the eligibility criteria and performed the data extraction from each study included. In case of disagreement, a third reviewer was consulted.

Of the 590 studies found, 46 were included. Most of the studies were carried out in Europe, between the years 2019 and 2022 and were cross-sectional studies. The minimum sample size was 38, and the maximum was 1,74,638 participants. Most studies included both males and females; six included only females and nine only males. The three most prevalent types of workers under study were health professionals, factory workers and firefighters. The most used method for assessing adherence to the MDP was the Mediterranean diet score. Overall, workers showed low or moderate adherence to the MDP.

This systematic review conducted to assess the adherence to the MDP in workers displays an urgent need to improve diet quality in the workplaces.