Comparing counselling alone versus counselling supplemented with guided use of a well-being app for university students experiencing anxiety or depression (CASELOAD): protocol for a feasibility trial.

BACKGROUND: University counselling services face a unique challenge to offer short-term therapeutic support to students presenting with complex mental health needs and in a setting which suits the academic timetable. The recent availability of mobile phone applications (apps) offers an opportunity to supplement face-to-face therapy and has the potential to reach a wider audience, maintain engagement between therapy sessions, and enhance therapeutic outcomes. The present study, entitled Counselling plus Apps for Students Experiencing Levels of Anxiety or Depression (CASELOAD), aims to explore the feasibility of supplementing counselling with guided use of a well-being app. METHODS/DESIGN: Forty help-seeking university students (aged 18 years and over) with symptoms of moderate anxiety or depression will be recruited from a University Counselling Service (UCS) in the United Kingdom (UK). Participants will be recruited via counsellors who provide the initial clinical assessment and who determine treatment allocation to one of two treatments on the basis of client-treatment fit. The two conditions comprise (1) counselling alone (treatment as usual/TAU) or (2) counselling supplemented with guided use of a well-being app (enhanced intervention). Trained counsellors will deliver up to six counselling sessions in each treatment arm across a 6-month period, and the session frequency will be decided by client-counsellor discussion. Assessments will occur at baseline, every counselling session, post-intervention (3 months after consent) and follow-up (6 months after consent). Assessments will include clinical measures of anxiety, depression, psychological functioning, specific mental health concerns (e.g. academic distress and substance misuse), resilience and therapeutic alliance. The usage, acceptability, feasibility and potential implications of combining counselling with guided use of the well-being app will be assessed through audio recordings of counselling sessions, telephone interviews with participants, focus groups with counsellors and counsellor notes. DISCUSSION: This study will inform the design of a randomised pilot trial and a definitive trial which aim to improve therapy engagement, reduce dropout and enhance clinical outcomes of student counselling. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN55102899

Mental health and behaviour of students of public health and their correlation with social support: a cross-sectional study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Future public health professionals are especially important among students partly because their credibility in light of their professional messages and activities will be tested daily by their clients; and partly because health professionals' own lifestyle habits influence their attitudes and professional activities. A better understanding of public health students' health and its determinants is necessary for improving counselling services and tailoring them to demand. Our aim was to survey public health students' health status and behaviour with a focus on mental health.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A cross-sectional study was carried out among public health students at 1-5-years (<it>N </it>= 194) with a self-administered questionnaire that included standardized items on demographic data, mental wellbeing characterized by sense of coherence (SoC) and psychological morbidity, as well as health behaviour and social support. Correlations between social support and the variables for mental health, health status and health behaviour were characterized by pairwise correlation.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The response rate was 75% and represented students by study year, sex and age in the Faculty. Nearly half of the students were non-smokers, more than one quarter smoked daily. Almost one-fifth of the students suffered from notable psychological distress. The proportion of these students decreased from year 1 to 5. The mean score for SoC was 60.1 and showed an increasing trend during the academic years. 29% of the students lacked social support from their student peers. Significant positive correlation was revealed between social support and variables for mental health. Psychological distress was greater among female public health students than in the same age female group of the general population; whereas the lack of social support was a more prevalent problem among male students.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Health status and behaviour of public health students is similar to their non-students peers except for their worse mental health. Future public health professionals should be better prepared for coping with the challenges they face during their studies. Universities must facilitate this process by providing helping services targeted at those with highest risk, and developing training to improve coping skills. Social support is also a potentially amenable determinant of mental health during higher education.</p

Service Leadership Qualities in University Students Through the Lens of Student Well-Being

With the emergence of the knowledge-based and service economies, the demand for service leadership is obvious. However, there are few models specifically designed for service leadership. Besides, most of the leadership models developed for university students are elitist leadership models, assuming only elites can be effective leaders. To promote service leadership in the higher education sector in Hong Kong, the Hong Kong Institute of Service Leadership and Management (HKI-SLAM) proposed the service leadership model. In this chapter, the basic qualities of effective service leaders are highlighted with reference to the attributes of student well-being commonly proposed in different student well-being models. Besides presenting evidence on the linkage between service leadership attributes and well-being, the chapter also examines the concordance of service leadership attributes and student well-being attributes described in different models. It is argued that through nurturing service leadership qualities in university students, their well-being is also enhanced.Department of Applied Social Science