Knowledge degree of Chagas disease in 2 health establishments in the city of Cochabamba, 2018-2019

Abstract

Chagas disease has a high prevalence in Cochabamba, approximately 10 to 12 out of 100 people are diagnosed with it. Given the high number of cases, this disease represents a public health problem and that was why the objective ofthis research was to know the information degree about the disease that a certain group of the population in Cochabamba had, in order to have a guiding panorama that allows us to know about the promotion and prevention needs of our population. T hat is why a survey was applied to detect the degree of knowledge about this disease, to 130 people between 15 and 78 years in 2 health facilities in the city of Cochabamba. The results obtained revealed that only 51,14% of the respondents answered correctly. Therefore, there is a Iow degree of knowledge, deficient and incomplete and, therefore, does not cover all aspects of relevance, which has an important impact on the incidence ofthis disease. According to the WHO in North Karelia (Finland) it was possible to reduce mortality by heart disease by 73% and reduce mortality by 44% by implementing health promotion programs. lt is concluded that it is necessary to implement greater promotion strategies since an inadequate degree of information was evidenced.