Building Bridges Bridging better relationships between high school students and General Practitioners Riverina Division of General Practice & Primary Health Ltd Incorporating Barrier Division

Program background Illawarra Division of General Practice initiated this program in conjunction with Illawarra health, Wollongong and Shellharbour Dept. of Education and training, Illawarra Institute for mental health and Illawarra High School Significant evidence indicating that young people will go to friends and family or no one for informal help on a range of problems including personal, emotional and suicidal problems before the formal help of a GP or health care professional (Deane et al., 2001; Wilson et al., 2003 ) Provides grounds for concern as young people are one of the only age-based groups in Australia whose psychosocial health status has not significantly improved in the last 40 years. (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 1998) Riverina Division of General Practice & Primary Health Ltd Incorporating Barrier Division

Program context The Building Bridges program was developed to create local ties with students, GP’s and health care workers in their area Each presentation covers: How can a GP or health professional help you Feelings to expect when you see a GP or Health professional Confidentiality –what does it mean? Medicare care cards and costs Question time – before each presentation the students are asked to write down ANY question they wish the GP to answer at the presentation. Often we get some ‘interesting’ ones but it provides a great opportunity for those students who are afraid to ask the question, to ask it anonymously Riverina Division of General Practice & Primary Health Ltd Incorporating Barrier Division

Evaluation The RDGP&PH presents Building Bridges to 8 (private and public) schools annually Pre evaluation results indicate: that a high percentage of year 10 students were unaware that they could obtain their own Medicare card at 16 yrs. That a high percentage of students were unclear as to what problems they could see a GP for ; and that there students did not know about confidentiality and were afraid the GP would tell their parents –especially in rural communities where there is often only 1 GP. Post evaluation results indicated: After the presentation, the majority of students said they would look into a Medicare card –with most saying they would wait until they were 18 yrs. Most students were now aware of what they could see a GP about and now understood GP confidentiality laws Students felt confident about making future appointments with their local GP Riverina Division of General Practice & Primary Health Ltd Incorporating Barrier Division