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Systematic Review
To examine mental health and well‐being, mental health service usage, and adverse effects of mental health first aid (MHFA) training on individuals in the communities in which MHFA training is delivered.
Twenty‐one studies involving a total of 22,604 participants were included in the review. Fifteen studies compared MHFA training with no intervention/waiting list, two studies compared MHFA training with an alternative mental health literacy intervention, and four studies compared MHFA training with an active or an attention control intervention. Our primary time point was between six and 12 months.
When MHFA training was compared with no intervention, it may have little to no effect on the mental health of individuals at six to 12 months, but the evidence is very uncertain (OR 0.88, 95% CI 0.61 to 1.28; 3 studies; 3939 participants). We judged all the results that contributed to this outcome as being at high risk of bias. No study measured mental health service usage at six to 12 months. We did not find published data on adverse effects.
Only one study with usable data compared MHFA training with an alternative mental health literacy intervention. The study did not measure outcomes in individuals in the community. It also did not measure outcomes at our primary time point of six to 12 months.
Four studies with usable data compared MHFA training to an active or attention control. None of the studies measured outcomes at our primary time point of six to 12 months.
We cannot draw conclusions about the effects of MHFA training on our primary outcomes due to the lack of good quality evidence. This is the case whether it is compared to no intervention, to an alternative mental health literacy intervention, or to an active control. Studies are at high risk of bias and often not sufficiently large to be able to detect differences.