Luis Joaquín García, professor at the University of Jaén, and researcher Jesús Sánchez explained the keys to projects such as PROCARE, DAREMOS PROADEMO, Digitas and Level Up.
16/11/2023.- Luis Joaquín García, professor at the University of Jaén (UJA) and head of the Network for the Promotion of Health and EMOtional Well-being of Young People (PROEMO (RED2022-134247-T) and Jesús Sánchez, researcher at the UJA, held a working meeting with Estrella Durá, Member of the European Parliament and Professor of Psychology at the University of Valencia.
The purpose of the meeting was to present to the representative of the European Parliament different interdisciplinary initiatives for the promotion of health and emotional well-being of young people, which are under the umbrella of the PROEMO Network, such as PROCARE, PROADEMO, DAREMOS, Digitas, Level Up and the different lines of the various research teams that make it up.
In this way, Luis Joaquín García made a tour of the main milestones achieved from 2015 to the present, with special emphasis on the “Report and Roadmap on the current state, needs and recommendations for the improvement of psychological assessment and the promotion of health and emotional well-being in young people”, carried out in 2018 and which was picked up by the Council of Europe. This strategic document will be updated in a new roadmap for 2025, aimed at identifying current gaps and providing new recommendations.
He then explained the keys to PROCARE (‘Selective prevention through a transdiagnostic intervention for adolescents at risk of emotional problems’), a pioneering initiative worldwide in the field of prevention and personalized medicine, since it is the first selective prevention program aimed at adolescents between 12 and 18 years of age at risk of suffering emotional problems.
He also stressed the objectives of the PROADEMO project (‘PROmocionAnDo la salud y el bienestar EMOcional de los adolescentes en el sector educativo, sanitario y la sociedad’), based on the preparation of useful materials and tools for educational, health and youth information personnel, as well as for the adolescents themselves, with the aim of improving the quality of the services offered in the field of adolescent emotional wellbeing and increasing emotional literacy.
During his presentation, Luis Joaquín García addressed the impact of other projects such as DAREMOS, focused on the early detection of adolescents at high risk of developing emotional problems such as anxiety or depression; Digitas, which seeks to promote literacy in adolescent mental health, through the creation of videos, podcasts or sound fiction documentaries, among other tools; or Level Up, a project led by a European consortium that aims to provide a new understanding of the transversal skills of higher education students.
Estrella Durá, who is a member of the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs and an alternate member of the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety in the European Parliament, praised the trajectory and work carried out by the PROEMO Network in these projects and the rest of the actions carried out by its team in favor of the prevention of emotional problems suffered by young people.
The MEP pointed out that both the approach of these projects and the target group are perfectly aligned with the priorities that the European institutions have recently established in their approach to mental health at the European level. She highlighted that both the Communication on “A Global Approach to Mental Health”, published by the European Commission in June 2023, and the own-initiative report, approved by the European Parliament’s Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, emphasize the need to adopt a preventive approach to mental health through the promotion of emotional well-being in vulnerable groups such as youth.
In this regard, Estrella Durá commented her interest in establishing synergies with her contribution as a legislator to the creation of materials for PROADEMO and the PROEMO roadmap and with her participation in workshops on adolescent mental health organized by the PROEMO Network. She also showed her willingness to disseminate and extend an invitation for the Network and its actions to be disseminated in the European Parliament.
