The used strategies are:
universal prevention: target to the general population;
selective prevention: focus on groups with associated risk factors;
indicated prevention: directed to individuals with accentuated risk patterns or risk behaviours.
The prevention unit has focused its work in two complementary axis:
Increase the quality of interventions through adequate strategies, mostly of selective and indicated prevention, with monitoring and evaluation of the interventions results.
The quality in prevention starts with the planning phase and seeking objectives with the mention of the expected results and respective evaluation and monitoring trough indicators and qualitative and quantitative data.
The prevention activity was adjusted to promote a more environmental approach, in a sense that individuals and their patterns of use can’t be turn apart of their contexts. This fact implies that the interventions should be based in stricter diagnosis, the interventions should be more selective and should know what results to achieve and how to measure them.
The Prevention Unit aims to produce knowledge, by the promotion of pilot-projects and by the design of guidelines, always with contributes of the teams that work in the field and apply different intervention models and from its technical and scientific knowledge.
These principles are shown in programmes and projects promoted by the prevention unit.
Contribute for IDT integrated intervention, investing in the search of answers adapted to the problems and needs, sharing resources in an dynamic way, internally and with the civil society.
In the frame of the Operational Plan for Integrated Responses (PORI), the prevention Unit, also invest in quality.
Actually, the intervention in PORI’s results in the implementation of 45 projects, mainly centred in selective and indicated prevention. The target groups are: children, younger people, families and the communities. The settings are schools, neibourghoods, recreational settings, universities, etc.
All the programmes and projects were implemented with the effort of experts in the prevention area, in the IDT’s Central and Regional Services.