de Valverde C
Instituto de Nutrición de Centro América y Panamá, (INCAP), Guatemala.
Arch Latinoam Nutr. 1989 Sep;39(3):365-81.
In Guatemala, as is the case in many of the other Central American countries, the pharmacy is often the only health resource used outside the household. This paper analyzes knowledge, attitudes and practices of the personnel from seven pharmacies located in marginal-urban areas of Guatemala. It also studies their interaction with 3,277 users related to all diseases, specifically those related to diarrheal disease and its treatment. Findings revealed that the pharmacies' personnel handle diarrheal disease in an empirical way, using medicines to treat the cause of the diarrhea, instead of trying to prevent dehydration. There are limitations and deficiencies of knowledge and practices related to the use and abuse of non-indicative medicines, insofar as the pharmacies' personnel and users are concerned. Findings also revealed that the Oral Rehydration Salts (ORS) are not used, and prepared oral serum is used in very small amounts, because these do not fit in popular expectations of a medicine that reduces diarrheic evacuations.
在危地马拉，如同许多其他中美洲国家一样，药店往往是家庭之外唯一被利用的医疗资源。本文分析了位于危地马拉城市边缘地区的七家药店工作人员的知识、态度和做法。同时研究了他们与3277名各类疾病患者，特别是与腹泻疾病及其治疗相关患者的互动情况。研究结果显示，药店工作人员以经验方式处理腹泻疾病，使用药物治疗腹泻病因，而非试图预防脱水。就药店工作人员和患者而言，在非适应症药物的使用和滥用方面，存在知识和做法上的局限与不足。研究结果还表明，口服补液盐未被使用，配制好的口服补液血清用量极少，因为这些不符合民众对减少腹泻排泄物药物的普遍期望。
