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School-based prevention for illicit drug use

Faggiano F et al (2014)

Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews - DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD003020.pub3

Evidence Categories

  • Care setting: School Setting
  • Population group: Adolescents
  • Intervention: Psychosocial interventions
  • Intervention: Education Interventions
  • Outcome: Change in drug/alcohol consumption

Type of Evidence

Systematic Review

Aims

"To evaluate the effectiveness of universal school-based interventions in reducing drug use compared to usual curricular activities or no intervention."

Findings

"School programmes based on a combination of social competence and social influence approaches showed, on average, small but consistent protective effects in preventing drug use, even if some outcomes did not show statistical significance. Some programmes based on the social competence approach also showed protective effects for some outcomes. Since the effects of school-based programmes are small, they should form part of more comprehensive strategies for drug use prevention in order to achieve a population-level impact."

Conclusions

"School programmes based on a combination of social competence and social influence approaches showed, on average, small but consistent protective effects in preventing drug use, even if some outcomes did not show statistical significance. Some programmes based on the social competence approach also showed protective effects for some outcomes.Since the effects of school-based programmes are small, they should form part of more comprehensive strategies for drug use prevention in order to achieve a population-level impact."