In 2017, our country became a member of the international network "Health Behavior in School-aged Children - HBSC" - an alliance of researchers who cooperate in studies conducted at the international level on the healthy behavior of school-aged children. Consisting of 45 member countries, this network has been surveying 11, 13, and 15-year-old school children every four years for 30 years to determine their health, well-being, and social problems. As a result of the survey, the assessment of the health status of schoolchildren and risk factors affecting their health and harmful habits are revealed. In addition to assessing the health of school children, the survey helps to determine the positive or negative dynamics achieved in this direction in previous years, and thus enables state institutions to set the main goals for improving the situation. It should be noted that Azerbaijan's membership in this international cooperation is recognized and supported by the World Health Organization. https://www.isim.az/az/pages/39/

Azerbaijan became a member of this network by order of the Ministry of Health and with support of the Ministry of Education. As a pilot project, in April 2017, specialists from the Public Health and Reforms Center (PHRC) of the Ministry of Health conducted a survey on the topic "Study of healthy lifestyle habits among schoolchildren" among 5, 7 and 9 grades students in 5 schools in each of the cities - Baku, Khizi and Sumgayit of the Republic of Azerbaijan. The pilot study conducted in accordance with the “Strategy for prevention and control of noncommunicable diseases in the Republic of Azerbaijan for 2015-2020” and paragraph 4.2 of the “Action Plan of the Strategic Plan of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Azerbaijan for 2014-2020” became the first stage of connecting Azerbaijan to the HBSC network. After the completion of the survey, the received data was analyzed and a report was prepared based on the results. These papers were presented at the conference of the International Network for the Study of Healthy Behavior in School-aged Children, held on June 19, 2017 in Bergen, Norway. Nabil Seyidov, Head of Health Policy and Reforms Department of the PHRC, who participated in the conference, briefed the conference participants on the achievements, challenges, technical issues related to the study of the methodology and preliminary results obtained during the survey in Azerbaijan. As a result of the success of the pilot survey conducted in Azerbaijan, our country was selected as a member of the international network "Research of healthy habits among school children". With this, Azerbaijan acquired the right to conduct HBSC research on a large scale throughout the country in the fall of this year.

The HBSC survey is conducted every four years according to the methodology adopted by WHO. The Health Behavior in School-aged Children (HBSC) survey was conducted on a large scale in September-October 2017 with the participation of 11, 13 and 15-year-old schoolchildren.

Initial information about this study was presented at the general meeting of the HBSC European Network “Health Behavior of School-aged Children” in Zagreb, Republic of Croatia, November 7-11, 2017. Representatives from the Public Health and Reforms Center of the Ministry of Health of Azerbaijan Republic Nabil Seyidov, Head of the Health Policy and Reforms Department, Sabina Babazadeh, Head of Project Coordination Department, and Narmin Aliyeva, Manager of Quality Standards of Medical Services Department participated in this event.