Community dermatology in Debre Markos: an attempt to define children’s dermatological needs in a rural area of Ethiopia

Abstract

We think our work highlights the general health and living conditions of Ethiopian school children. The dermatological problems affecting most of the children could improve just by better skin hygiene conditions. The presence at the community level of health workers trained to perform a correct and early diagnosis and distribute efficacious, low-cost therapies would be a relevant step forward. We think this project could help draw attention and interest to these issues.

Skin diseases among schoolchildren in Ghana, Gabon, and Rwanda

“…Although this disease is endemic among Caucasian children in Europe and North America, it has not been observed in studies conducted in West Africa, which may be explained by differences in hair type . However, studies conducted in East Africa and especially in Ethiopia cite prevalences ranging from 3.6% to 57.1% …”

“…1 The majority of data on the prevalences of skin diseases in Africa come from hospital or dispensary-based records and do not necessarily represent the real prevalences of skin diseases within populations. 8 Few population-based studies on this subject have been conducted. [8][9][10][11][12] The proportion of schoolchildren in Africa with one or more skin diseases ranges between 35% and 80%.…”

Are scabies and impetigo “normalised”? A cross-sectional comparative study of hospitalised children in northern Australia assessing clinical recognition and treatment of skin infections

“…Strategies which potentially overcome the difficulties associated with the diagnosis and treatment of individual patients such as community dermatology[42–44] and mass drug administration[45] should be considered. Specific training of health workers has been shown to improve recognition and treatment of skin infection in resource-poor settings[46].…”

“…Improvements in the accessibility to and availability of appropriate existing diagnostic tools such as dermatoscopy in resource limited settings should occur in parallel with further research exploring novel, practical diagnostic techniques[49, 50]. Community dermatology has demonstrated promise as an effective and affordable strategy in addressing common skin conditions including infections in low resource settings by addressing skin disease at a community level[42–44]. This approach encompasses several strategies including the training of community health care workers to recognize and treat skin disease, public health measures to address the determinants of skin disease, the education of community members and the prioritization of conditions to tackle based on accurate epidemiological data and simplifying their treatment[51].…”

Researching accessible and affordable treatment for common dermatological problems in developing countries. An Ethiopian experience

“…Most populations living in rural areas of Ethiopia often have no access to essential drugs, and traditional preparations of plant origin might often represent the only alternative to synthetic drugs 7 . This would be the case of dermatological disease treatments, as despite the very high frequency of these problems (particularly fungal infections and eczema‐like lesions), most Ethiopian rural populations do not benefit from dermatological care, and dermatological diseases are often ineffectively cared for 8 . In rural areas, people frequently use homemade remedies and buy potentially dangerous non‐prescribed drugs.…”