[Effects of the health care model of the Mexican Social Security Institute-COPLAMAR program on the health status of the underprivileged rural population of Mexico].

In 1983 the IMSS-COPLAMAR Program (administrated by the Mexican Institute of Social Security since 1979) established an integral health care model aimed at preparing both the clinical workers and the people of the communities to their care, so they could: 1) Identify the most frequent diseases in their town, together with their conditional causes; 2) Plan, program and execute activities oriented to reduce the morbi-mortality of those ailments; 3) Evaluate the results and, based on them decide to continue or to modify the program. The application of this pattern has made possible to maintain or intensify the improvements obtained since the beginning by the IMSS-COPLAMAR Program (low frequency of preventable disease, a decrease in the consultation demand rate, an increase in the health promotion activities), but additionally it has promoted the adoption of measures to resolve the common health problems in the Mexican rural population. Since the beginning of this program (1983) a decrease in the frequency of digestive infections has been observed and we remark progresses in the control of pregnancy, childbirth and puerperium complications, and malnutrition. An important decrease in consultation demand rate has been registered and a big increase in the promotional activities, in accordance to the increase of the community participation through the health committees, voluntary promotors, traditional therapeutics, and rural assistants. The rural population covered by the IMSS-COPLAMAR Program increased from 11.5 millions in 1983 to 13.7 millions in 1985.