The Drug Education Navigation Tool

Dr Tim Legrand and Matthew Scott

Tonic Consultants

tonicconsultants.com

The Context

Dec 07: The Children’s Plan

Oct 08: Drug Education Review

Sept 09: Blueprint published

5th Nov 09: PSHE to be made statutory

13th Nov 09: Drugs Guidance for Schools Consultation

ObjectivesDEF asked us to produce a piece of work which

will help those planning and delivering drug education to be sure they are working from what the evidence suggests is effective

It needs be accessible to an audience of those who actually deliver drug education in schools and other settings

In short, how can we make it as easy as possible for everyone to deliver drug education in ways that have been shown to work? What follows will be a live document

What the research says:

Skills based interventions are effective in equipping children and young people with the confidence to make better decisions (Faggiano et al, 2005)… especially when delivered via interactive lessons

Parental involvement boosts the effectiveness of drug education

…especially for children/young people with multiple risk factors

Interactive lessons provide the best means of delivering information and social skills training

Issues

Conflicting or contrasting methodologies hinders meaningful comparisons: NICE: ‘The diversity of the studies identified, in terms of

intervention content and outcomes presented meant that it was not possible to synthesise data across the types of programme identified’ (2007*).

Longitudinal evaluations of drug education programmes are infrequent and expensive

Substance-related ‘harm’ is difficult to measure and it is thereby difficult to assess efficacy of drug education

*A review of the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of interventions delivered in primary and secondary schools to prevent and/or reduce alcohol use by young people under 18 years old

Best Practice Principles

Drug Education Navigation Tool

1 A stepwise approach: how to choose the right drug education programme for your group

2 Principles of drug education

3 Key questions of programme development

4 Needs analysis

5 Risk and protective factors

6 Signposted to evidenced resources

7 Evaluated programmes