Sexual health concerns among teenage population in our sanitary context
A.B. Melgar Borrego, R. Julián Viñals, A. Gómez Lumbreras, L. Martín Méndez, O. Bermejo Pablos, I. Bosch Meléndez

SUMMARY

Study objective: To know the sexual issues that teenagers find most interesting after sex educational lectures.

Design: Cross-sectional descriptive study.

Site: Urban public high school.

Participants: 102 students from 3 rd year of Spanish secondary education (14-17 years old).

Interventions: Professionals from a primary care team gave 2 one-hour sexual health lessons in school. Topics of the lectures included: genital anatomy and physiology, pregnancy, contraceptive methods and sexually transmitted diseases (STD).

Main measurements: Following the lectures, the students filled a self-administered anonymous questionnaire including: age, sex, 1 st and 2 nd most interesting topics of the sex education and usefulness of the lectures.

Results: 102 teenagers took part, with an average age of 15 years. 59% of the participants were female. Condom use (47.1%) followed by sexually transmitted diseases (STD) (39.2%) were considered the most interesting topics. Other contraception methods (10.8%) came next. Regarding the 2 nd most interesting topic, 29.4% of the students did not show any preference, STD were selected by 28.4% of them, and 25.3% chose condom use. Condom considerations were most interesting for 60% of male and 40.7% of female students. STD were the main concern for the female population (44.1%) whereas only 35% of male students selected this topic as the first choice.

Conclusions: Among the teenage population included in the study, condom use, followed by the impact of STD, are the main concerns. Other contraception methods are regarded as less important. Students consider very useful the sexual education coming from the primary care team.

KEY WORDS

Sex education, adolescent, health promotion, school.