While the need for holistic health and social service responses is increasingly being articulated in Australia, the discussion is not always matched by improvements in service delivery. This project ...looked at one service setting where youth workers were encouraged to take a holistic approach to their clients' often-complex needs. Interviews with youth workers revealed five key elements of their approach, and also the challenges and organisational barriers that workers often confront when attempting to collaborate with other services. The paper concludes with several recommendations for informing practice and policy with the aim of developing sustainable models of service collaboration.
Nicola Gray and colleagues
examine the mutual reinforcement of adolescent health and education, the challenges of intersectoral working, and the joint investment needed to secure wellbeing during ...adolescence, into adult life, and for the next generation
This article analyzes the relevance of the comprehensive definition of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) to adolescents and identifies adolescent-specific implications for the ...implementation of an essential package of SRHR interventions. The delivery of a comprehensive approach to SRHR targeting adolescents is underpinned by five principles—equity, quality, accountability, multisectorality, and meaningful engagement. All SRHR interventions included in the package are relevant to adolescents, given the diversity of adolescents' SRHR needs and considering their specific attributes, circumstances, and experiences. Ensuring that this package is available, accessible, and acceptable to adolescents requires an approach that looks at adolescents as being biologically and socially distinct from other age groups and acknowledges that they face some specific barriers when accessing SRHR services. This article provides cross-cutting strategies for the implementation of a comprehensive approach to SRHR for adolescents and specific considerations in delivering each intervention in the package of essential SRHR interventions. To further implement the International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action, a prerequisite for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, SRHR interventions must be adolescent responsive, delivered through multiple platforms, leveraging multisectoral collaboration, and strengthening accountability and participation.
The 1994 International Conference on Population and Development established a basis for the advancement of adolescent sexual and reproductive health and rights (ASRHR) that endures today. Twenty-five ...years later, our vision for the future warrants reflection based on a clear understanding of the opportunities and challenges before us. Inclusion of adolescents on global, regional, and national agendas; increased investment in ASRHR policies and programs; renewed commitments to universal health coverage; increased school enrollment; and advances in technology are all critical opportunities we can and must leverage to catalyze progress for adolescents. At the same time, a range of significant challenges remain, have newly emerged, or can be seen on the horizon, including persistent denial of adolescent sexuality; entrenched gender inequality; resistance to meaningfully engaging adolescents and young people in political and programmatic processes; weak systems, integration, and multisectoral coordination; changes in population dynamics; humanitarian and climate crises; and changes in family and community structures. To achieve as much progress toward our vision for ASRHR as possible, the global ASRHR community must take strategic and specific steps in the next 10 years within five areas for action: (1) mobilize and make full use of political and social support for ASRHR policies and programs; (2) increase and make effective use of external and domestic funding for ASRHR; (3) develop, communicate, apply, and monitor enabling and protective laws and policies for ASRHR; (4) use and improve available ASRHR data and evidence to strengthen advocacy, policies, and programs; and (5) manage the implementation of ASRHR strategies at scale with quality and equity.
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