Treatment-seeking behavior and practices among caregivers of children <5 years with presumed malaria in rural Uganda

Abstract

Background
We aimed to determine the rate of herbal medicine usage and the treatment-seeking behaviour of caregivers of children under 5 years of age with presumed or confirmed malaria in in an endemic area of Uganda.

Methods
We interviewed parents/ guardians of 722 children aged 6 months to 5 years, who had experienced an episode of presumed malaria in the previous 3 months, about treatments taken and the associated outcomes.

Results
Although 36.1% of patients initially took herbal medicine, most then sought modern medical care. Overall, 79.2% received Artemether-Lumefantrine (AL), but only 45.7% had a diagnostic test to confirm the diagnosis and 42.7% received the correct dose of AL. Of the 36.6% of patients treated in drug shops, few had a diagnostic test (9.8%) or received the correct dose of AL (30.2%). Co-trimoxazole (CTX ) was taken by 38%, in most cases together with AL. At day 7, only 74% of patients who had taken AL felt “cured”. However, there were no significant differences in the self-reported outcomes associated with different treatments.

Conclusion
Almost all patients who took herbal medicine also took modern antimalarials, so further research is needed to explore potential interactions between these. . Although formal health facilities provide correct diagnosis and dose of AL to a majority of children with malaria, many children still received inappropriate antibiotics. Quality of care was worse in drug shops than in formal health facilities.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Merlin Willcox: orcid.org/0000-0002-5227-3444

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