The National Prevention Conference (NPK) is a working group of the statutory umbrella organizations of health, accident, pension and long-term care insurers. It was established in July 2015 on the basis of the "Act to Strengthen Health Promotion and Prevention (Prevention Act)". Its task is to develop and update a national prevention strategy.
After 2019, the NPK has now produced its second Prevention Report and submitted it to the Federal Ministry of Health. This analyzes how the commitment of the social insurance institutions and private health insurance has developed in health promotion and prevention since the first Prevention Report up to 2022. The Report serves as a basis for the further development of the national prevention strategy.
The Chair of Social Determinants of Health, headed by Prof. Dr. Matthias Richter, contributed to the preparation of the second Prevention Report. Dr. Laura Hoffmann, Research Associate at the Chair of Social Determinants of Health, has written a chapter on the topic "Characterization of the target group of children with psychological (including addiction) stressed parents", which consists of nine double pages. It deals with "epidemiology and prevalence of children of mentally (including addiction-) burdened parents", "health-related influencing factors", "health situation" and "prevention needs and potentials".
"The chapter describes the target group of children of psychologically stressed parents," explains Dr. Hoffmann. "The explanations of health-related influencing factors and the health situation show that these children are exposed to various physical and especially psychological stresses and have comparatively poorer health, which is why there is an increased need for prevention among them."
In this context, children and adolescents represent a particularly vulnerable group, as they are confronted with special stresses and impairments as a result of living with at least one parent with a disease, and thus themselves have a significantly increased risk of also developing a mental disorder. Compared to the general population and depending on the clinical picture of the parents, this risk is even increased by a factor of two to ten. The affected children often grow up under unfavorable living conditions and also more frequently under disadvantageous sociodemographic conditions. The risk of later illness in the target group can be significantly reduced by early intervention, monitoring and support for affected families and children.
The subchapter "Overall societal cooperation on the topic of mental health in the family context" in the fourth chapter "NPK project on overall societal cooperation" refers, among other things, to Dr. Hoffmann's remarks.
"We provided additions to the main text, so to speak, with the description of the target group and present why this target group is vulnerable and requires special consideration," she said.
The report also states that from 2021-2026, the NPK will pilot whole-society collaboration on "Health promotion and prevention in care" and "Mental health in the family context" as part of the national prevention strategy. The evaluation results of this trial will then be explained in the third Prevention Report.
To the second Prevention Report of the National Prevention Conference (NPK)
To the homepage of the Chair of Social Determinants of Health
Contact:
Dr. Laura Hoffmann
Chair of Social Determinants of Health
Georg-Brauchle-Ring 60/62
80992 München
phone: 089 289 24194
e-mail: hoffmann.laura(at)tum.de
Text: Romy Schwaiger
Photos: NPK/private