Parasitosis en niños preescolares de la parroquia el Retiro y su relación con el hacinamiento y la educación sanitaria.

Abstract

Intestinal parasitic diseases are caused by protozoa and helminths, affecting the digestive system. Transmission occurs through contact with contaminated soils or through the consumption of spoiled food and water, with symptoms being diverse and often nonspecific, including diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain, among others. In Ecuador, intestinal parasitosis in preschool children, particularly in rural areas such as the parish of El Retiro, constitutes a serious public health problem related to extreme poverty and inadequate sanitary conditions. This was an analytical, descriptive, and correlational study, where we focused on children aged 3 to 5 years from two rural schools, exploring the relationship between the prevalence of parasitosis (dependent variable) and the level of health education and overcrowding (independent variables). The population size was 111 children, but only 64 parents consented to participate, becoming the sample size for our research. The results obtained regarding the prevalence of parasitosis showed that 35.9% were infected and 64.1% were not. Among the most common types of parasites, we found Entamoeba dispar (12.5%), Endolimax nana (6.3%), and Ascaris lumbricoides (4.7%), although other parasites such as Cryptosporidium spp., Entamoeba coli, Iodamoeba bütschlii, and Giardia lamblia were also identified, each with 3.1%. Through descriptive tables, we obtained the frequencies of the results from the health education and overcrowding surveys (Tables 9 and 10), evaluating the level of health education. Subsequently, we analyzed the correlation between health education questions and parasitosis (Table 11), and the same approach was applied to the results for overcrowding and its correlation with parasitosis (Table 12). Using the Chi-square test, we concluded that there is no significant relationship between the level of health education and overcrowding with the prevalence of parasitosis. However, a significant connection was identified between children's weight loss in health education and the type of housing in overcrowding.