IMPROVA

Promoting mental health in adolescence is of central importance

Around half of all mental health problems in the adult population begin before or during adolescence. Young people who have experienced mental health problems before the age of 14 have a higher risk of suffering from mental disorders in adulthood. Mental health problems in adolescence are associated with a higher risk of suicide, which is the second leading cause of death in people aged 15 to 29 worldwide. Depression and anxiety disorders are among the top five causes of overall disease burden in this age group. Neurodevelopmental disorders such as ADHD are a major contributor to school failure, behavioural problems, drug addiction and exclusion in adolescents and young adults. Statistics show that the adolescent mental health crisis in Europe is worsening. A rapid, sustainable and effective solution is needed.
IMPROVA is a major step forward in the field of adolescent mental health and wellbeing through the creation of an eHealth intervention platform. Young people, teachers, parents, experts and policy makers are working together to improve mental health and wellbeing, identify and prevent mental health problems at an early stage and combat stigmatisation and social inequalities related to mental health.

The IMPROVA online platform will be developed together with stakeholders such as young people, parents, teachers, school health professionals and policy makers based on materials already developed and tested in more than 20 projects of the consortium members.
The platform will include components for adolescents, parents, teachers and school health professionals in complementary and synergistic modules. After a series of pilot tests, IMPROVA will be implemented in a randomised Stepped Wedge Trial Design (SWTD) in randomly selected secondary schools in four countries (France, Germany, Romania and Spain), involving 12,800 adolescents. Effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and cost-benefit ratio will be calculated. Using implementation science methodology, IMPROVA will work with policy makers and stakeholders to develop transferable, evidence-based practices, methods and guidance for scaling up the IMPROVA platform.

IMPROVA aims to provide stakeholders and policy makers with an evidence-based, innovative, large-scale and comprehensive intervention and plan for scaling up mental health promotion and mental disorder prevention interventions for youth.