Post Traumatic Primary Prevention Interventions with School, Community and University

The recent hurricanes in Louisiana especially Hurricanes Katrina and Rita affected many school children and their parents resulting in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) being identified as one of the major mental health problems. School nurses identified a need for more education on the topic of PTSD in children. This need was documented in post-disaster surveys initiated by Louisiana Public Health Institute (LPHI) and participants were school nurses from Southeast Louisiana public schools In a partnership with LPHI, a group of four Louisiana State University Health Science Center (LSUHSC) faculty developed a program that provided school nurses with the education to define, recognize and screen for the symptoms of PTSD. Tools for screening for PTSD and methods to building resilience in all children were included. LPHI staff and LSUHSC faculty developing the program felt that the school nurses needed to be able to share the information with both teachers and parents at their schools. Booklets were designed to provide the nurses the ability to share this information with teachers and parents in an easy to understand format that could be used in the home and school setting. The programs offered Continuing Education hours and were free to school nurses across Louisiana. A total of 7 programs were held reaching 150 participants, impacting over 125,000 students. Evaluation results indicated that there was a significant increase in confidence and knowledge levels of participants, which shows the training as an effective strategy to address students' needs.