Abstract

RESTREPO, BERTA NELLY; PINEDA, JESÚS MARÍA  and  PARRA HENAO, GABRIEL JAIME. Application and evaluation of educational materials for dengue prevention in an educative institution of Medellin, Colombia. CES Med. [online]. 2011, vol.25, n.1, pp.31-41. ISSN 0120-8705.

Introduction: In the absence of an effective vaccine to prevent dengue, it is necessary to implement educational strategies for vector control. Objective: To evaluate the efficacy of using educative materials for instruction and learning about dengue. Methods: A quasi experimental pre/post design was performed. The study population was 66 children of an educational institution in Medellin. The selection of the school and the study population was for convenience. The educational strategies consisted of watching the video game "El Invitado mortal", and develop a "Juego de parqués sobre dengue". The data collection before and after intervention included knowledge and practice tests for schoolchildren. Results: It was observed after the intervention, an statistically significant increase in knowledge of the students in the following variables related to symptoms of fever (56.1% vs. 95.4 % p < 0.001), headache (6.1 % vs. 27.7 %, p < 0.003) and myalgia (12.1 % vs. 61.5 %, p < 0.001), mode of transmission (68.2 % vs. 95.4 %, p = 0.001) and the preventive measure "elimination of breeding sites" (65. 2 % vs. 86.2 %, p = 0.015). It was obvious even before the intervention, the disease management should be in health institutions (90.0 % vs. 100 %, p < 0.001). Over 95 % of students reported acceptance of video and game. Conclusions: These results suggest that the game as an educational medium is an important tool in understanding the concepts, besides being a participatory activity and satisfactory. Therefore could be used in prevention and control programs.

Keywords : Dengue; Knowledge and practices; Vector control; Efficacy.

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