Abstract

Background: Although malaria incidence is estimated to have decreased by 41% globally, 91 countries, including Nigeria have ongoing malaria transmission. Effective treatment and prevention of malaria at home by the masses will help in rolling back malaria burden to a minimum. This study was done to evaluate the home management of malaria at 2 local government areas of Abia State, Nigeria, with a view to determining areas of improvement.

Method: This was a descriptive cross-sectional study used to evaluate the home management of malaria. Four hundred and eighty respondents, aged 18 to 52 years, who presented their babies for immunization, were serially recruited. Half of the study population (240) were selected from each of the 2 Local Government Areas (LGA) under study. The immunization exercises took place at the Aba North and Aba South local government areas of Abia State. These immunization exercises held once a week at the 2 LGAs respectively over the study period. Information sought was on the knowledge and other aspects of home management of malaria. These information retrieved were analyzed.

Results: Overwhelming majority, 465 (96.8%) of the respondents had secondary and tertiary education, 411 (85.6%) were married and 259 (53.7%) were traders. Vast majority, 426 (88.7%) had good knowledge of the symptoms of malaria. One hundred and eighty eight (39.1%) would prefer artemisinin based combination therapy for the treatment of their ill children. One hundred and ninety three 193 (40.2%) purchased antimalarial drugs over the counter (OTC). 454(94.5%) depended on the drug doses recommended by the medicine vendors they bought drugs from. A large number, 328 (68.3%), of the respondents would take their convulsing child to the hospital as first treatment option, 84(15.4%) and 34(7%) would apply palm kernel oil and herbal medications respectively. A vast majority, 439(89.5%), 429(88.1%) and 418(87.1%) would apply environmental cleanliness, indoor spraying of insecticides and netting of doors/windows, respectively, as vector control measures. While 208 (43.3%) possessed insecticide treated nets (ITN), only 163 (34%) knew how to apply these nets appropriately.

Conclusion: The knowledge of the cause, symptoms and appropriate treatment of malaria by respondents in this study is high. However, majority of them depend on the purchase of OTC drugs and dose recommendation of patent medicine vendors. Also, the rate of possession and appropriate application of ITN among the caregivers is low. It is recommended that the government should organize regular training and retraining of the patent medicine dealers. Also, there should be regular education of the citizenry on home management of malaria and the correct dose for the available antimalarial drugs.

Keywords: Home Management; Malaria; Aba North; Aba South

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Citation

Citation: Chukwuemeka Ngozi Onyearugha., et al. "Evaluating the Home Management and Prevention of Malaria in Two Local Government Areas in South-East Nigeria".Acta Scientific Paediatrics 4.1 (2020): 24-30.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Chukwuemeka Ngozi Onyearugha., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.