Summary Background It is critical that medical educators actively address the growing mental health burden affecting medical students. The motivation to present a mental health programme to medical students at the University of Tasmania arose in response to a recent tragedy within the student body. This emphasised the necessity of developing an effective skill‐based initiative for our students. We describe a peer‐led programme targeting mental health borne from this event. The aim of this article is to outline the development of this programme and to report on the preliminary feedback. Methods This article presents a peer‐led programme, delivered to medical students in the fourth year of a 5‐year undergraduate degree by peers from within the student cohort. We used a multipronged approach, with the programme consisting of a five‐session workshop and a supplementary resource book. A post‐workshop survey was administered as formative evaluation. A total of 19 out of 20 participants responded to the survey. Results and discussion All respondents agreed that the programme helped to reduce the stigma of mental health disease in medicine and improved both peer support and self‐care practices. All students agreed that they would recommend this programme to peers, and that it provided a welcome opportunity to talk about mental health and normalised mental health concerns. Key to the success of the programme was its peer‐led nature. The programme is an example of an innovative and effective programme design that can help to guide medical educators to further support the next generation of medical practitioners with their mental health skills.

The impact of change in socio-economic status (SES) from childhood to adulthood (SES mobility) on adult diet is not well understood. This study examined associations between three SES mobility variables (area disadvantage, education, occupation) and adult diet quality. 1482 Australian participants reported childhood area-level SES in 1985 (aged 10–15 years) and retrospectively reported highest parental education and main occupation (until participant age 12) and own area-level SES, education, occupation and dietary intake in 2004–2006 (aged 26–36 years). A Dietary Guidelines Index (DGI) was calculated from food frequency and habit questionnaires. A higher score (range 0–100) indicated better diet quality. Sex-stratified linear regression models adjusted for confounders. Area-level SES mobility was not associated with diet quality. Compared with stable high (university) education, stable low (school only) was associated with lower DGI scores (males: β = –5·5, 95 % CI: −8·9, –2·1; females: β = –6·3, 95 % CI: −9·3, –3·4), as was downward educational mobility (participant’s education lower than their parents) (males: β = –5·3, 95 % CI: −8·5, –2·0; females: β = –4·5, 95 % CI: −7·2, –1·7) and stable intermediate (vocational) education among males (β = –3·9, 95 % CI: −7·0, −0·7). Compared with stable high (professional/managerial) occupation, stable low (manual/out of workforce) males (β = –4·9, 95 % CI: −7·6, –2·2), and participants with downward occupation mobility (males: β = –3·2, 95 % CI: −5·3, –1·1; females: β = –2·8, 95 % CI: −4·8, –0·8) had lower DGI scores. In this cohort, intergenerational low education and occupation, and downward educational and occupational mobility, were associated with poor adult diet quality.

The quality of education of any distance learning programme is maintained b y various ways, such as: quality of study material, internal and external evaluation, and student support methods and so on. The above aspects should be available in aspects to the Post graduate degree students. In this research Ex Post Facto research with field survey is used. It was carried out all over Tamil Nadu. The students who have enrolled for Distance post graduate Programme through Study Centres of Tamil Nadu Open University (TNOU) ,Anna malai University and Alagappa University were taken into consideration for collecting data. The total sample size was 600 respondents who were selected equally from all locations. The primary data were collected through questionnaire cum interview schedule method. The questionnaire is well structured and tested for reliability, testability and analytical ability. This study concludes that distance education programmes. With such a huge network spanning across the country, and the growth being exponential in a comparatively short period of time, there is a growing concern for the quality in education being imparted through such institutions. This study has confirmed that most of the students are highly satisfied towards the management education by the distance education mode expect few facts, there are students not satisfied with the PCP time schedule, syllabus covered by the course material and stipulated time for the payments of course fees. This study has identified some of the dissatisfying factors and suggested various ways and means to overcome those problems. Based on this research it may presume that there would be grater satisfaction towards most of the tested variables.