The South Eastern Trust’s Sexual Health Team brought its Health Bus to Downpatrick’s South Eastern Regional College (SERC) for a student information session, during Sexual Health Awareness Week.
Sexual Health Nurse Claire McCafferty shared how the team had driven the bus to the campus to engage with the students and promote this really important service.
“The bus is something that is a little bit different. The students are here in smaller groups and they are more open to asking the team questions. In a classroom setting there is more people so it can be a bit more daunting to ask a question. We want to get across who we are and that we are here for their questions, for their sexual health and their sexual reproductive health.”
Claire continued, “The engagement here at the South Eastern Regional College has been really good. We held a quiz and the young people seemed to know a lot more than we thought but there are still myths out there and we wanted to dispel these and be a point of contact for questions.”
Claire explained how there is no age limit on their service. “We will see everybody. If someone is under 16, we are of course very conscious of safeguarding. This is a confidential service for everybody of any age.”
For those wishing to access the service, the South Eastern Trust Sexual Health Team is based in Lisburn, Downpatrick and Bangor. “We have different sites and different days in those clinics and we do our best, particularly for young people to facilitate their sexual health and sexual reproductive health on the day,” said Claire.
As well as bringing the bus to higher education campuses, Claire added how it is also brought to local hostels and the Simon Community. “It is part of our inclusion health project to try and engage with people who may find it more difficult to come to our services. Even though we are based in different places, sometimes people need to travel and public transport is not always the easiest to access. it is about providing help and information to those more vulnerable members of our community.”