Editorial

Welcome to this second issue of 2022.

The collection of papers in this issue presents findings from a range of interesting studies that explore quite different and practical aspects of health promotion and education.

In the first paper, Illaria Marcomini, Anne Destrebecq, Debora Rosa and Stefano Terzoni outline an investigation into nursing students’ preparedness to perform key quality and safety education skills in Italy, using the Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) Framework. Their study suggests that quality of care and safety need to be better integrated into educational nursing programmes in Italy. They conclude that the QSEN framework represents a valid guide for developing educational interventions and knowledge, skills and attitudes for implementation of these interventions in the nursing context. In the second paper, Emma Williams, David Allison and Sarah Willis highlight that young people are at considerable risk of developing mental health illnesses while noting that interventions in the school setting have been found to be effective in promoting positive mental health. They used the Medical Research Council (MRC) framework for the development and evaluation of complex interventions to design and test a methodologically robust mental health promotion intervention for school children aged 13–14 years in the North West of England and report on findings related to the initial stages of the MRC framework that were applied to this.

The profound impacts of climate change and unsustainable resource use on health are highlighted to be largely outside of the traditional domain of health that public health professionals operate in by Lindsey Vold, Lauren Wallar and Andrew Papdopoulos in the third paper in this issue. The authors present a new paradigm in public health education and practice that integrates ecological determinants of health (EDoH) to prepare students and practitioners to address complex public health issue of ecological origin using intersectoral approaches. They introduce a set of seven competencies that describe what students should be able to do in relation to applying the EDoH paradigm to a complex health problem in health studies education. Using Miller’s Pyramid, the authors propose recommendations to further advance EDoH competencies for students and health professionals and argue that integration of the EdoH competencies into health education curricula can prepare students and indeed the future workforce to respond to the ecologically determined health needs of their communities and future populations.

The final paper in this collection focuses on the menopause as an important stage in life for women that can impact their health, family and economic situation. Mansoureh Khandehroo, Seyedeh Belin Tavakoly Sany, D. Oakley and Nooshin Peyman’s study utilised a randomised control trial that investigated the effect of health literacy training on the quality of life for menopausal women in Iran. Their findings demonstrated that health literacy strategies in health education and providing a supportive environment are influential in promoting a good quality of life for menopausal women.

I hope that you enjoy reading the papers in this issue which continues to reflect diverse international health promotion and health education research. I continue to welcome your comments related to the journal. Importantly, I encourage you to continue to submit contributions to the International Journal of Health Promotion and Education which celebrates rigorous peer review and a broad and far-reaching audience.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).