Oral papers
Sexual Health Counselling and Sexual Therapy via Video Link or Internet for University Students in Finnish Student Health Services (FSHS)
M. Tossavainen
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Finnish Student Health Services, Tampere, Finland
https://doi.org/10.21465/2016-KP-OP-0021
Fulltext (english, pages 40-40).pdf
Abstracts
Objective: A need for sexual counseling and therapy is very common among both male and female university students. More than twenty percent of students are unsatisfied with their sexual life and ten percent of students suffer from sexual dysfunctions. There are fourteen Student Health Service units for university students in Finland, but only a few of them have personnel specialized in sexual counseling. Since 2013 FSHS has offered a free nationwide secure internet-based counseling service and sexual therapy for students not having it in their local Student Health Service. This presentation introduces the prevalent causes for asking to be treated in virtual sexual therapy and some case examples of the treatment.
Design and Method: Selected data collected from September 2013 till April 2016 in internet-based counseling services: Case examples and descriptive statistics.
Results: Erectile dysfunction, female genital pain, fear or disgust of any sexual activities and lack of interest in sexuality were causes for participating in internetbased sexual therapy. Most students reported the virtual contact was informative and encouraging enough to ease their concerns. In cases with comorbidity of mental or physical symptoms and diseases the internet- based contact served mainly as a facilitator to seek out the proper face-to-face health care in local health services.
Conclusions: The secure internet-based sexual counseling and therapy services are an excellent alternative and addition to traditional appointments and services especially in cases of mild problems and in need for support or evaluation of the mind-related reasons for sexual concerns.