Tele-education for continuing education in mental health for family healthcare teams: an experience in Pernambuco, Brazil

Studies have shown that actions relating to mental healthcare are rare within the Family Health Strategy. There is a need to raise professionals' awareness and training. Telehealth has taken on an important role because it favors creation of collaborative services between healthcare professionals and specialists working remotely. This paper presents strategies for implementing and evaluating the mental health web conference seminars offered by RedeNUTES for family healthcare teams in Pernambuco, Brazil. The synchronous seminars take place weekly and are presented by teleconsultants from the healthcare or educational network. The sessions are recorded and made available for consultation at the Virtual Library. In 2009, 39 seminars took place. Good results were achieved regarding the overall rating of the seminars, degree of understanding of topics presented, teaching material used and duration of the sessions. It was concluded that this service provided a good space for continuing education on mental health.