EASE-Y: Promoting mental health wellbeing among vulnerable young adolescents

The EASE-Y project aims to contribute to the promotion of mental health (MH) wellbeing and prevention of MH disorders in particularly vulnerable early adolescents, such as children in precarious socio-economic living conditions and children in alternative care (AC), and particularly migrants, refugees, children displaced from Ukraine and Roma children. The action will be implemented in Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary and Slovakia.

To do so, it will pilot test the use of an evidence-based intervention for young adolescents, Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions (EASE), developed by WHO. EASE is a group-based brief psychological intervention that aims to improve the mental health of early adolescents aged 10 to 15 struggling with symptoms of mental health conditions such as anxiety and depression. Relying on a task-shifting approach, the intervention will equip lay helpers and carers with skills to identify and respond to the MH needs of vulnerable children.

Backed by a rigorous research action, the project will evaluate its effectiveness and provide implementation and policy recommendations for its further scale-up. Child-friendly psycho-education materials together with awareness raising and advocacy activities will increase early detection of MH complaints in early adolescents and access to MH care for them and their caregivers.

The project intends to train 14 EASE Trainers in the EU and 46 EASE facilitators in the four countries, and to reach at least 720 vulnerable early adolescents and ± 600 caregivers. The project builds on synergies between the previously funded EU4H projects – Well-U and U- RISE, which promote WHO-developed scalable MHPSS interventions – and will contribute to the EU Commission’s Communication on a comprehensive mental health approach the EU Healthier Together EU NCD Initiative’s strand on Mental Health.