Mexican use of lead in the treatment of empacho: Community, clinic, and longitudinal patterns

This paper discusses research designed to investigate community, clinic, and longitudinal patterns in use of lead as a treatment for empacho, a folk illness manifest by gastrointestinal symptoms. The same questionnaire used in a clinic-based study seven years previously in Guadalajara, Mexico, was u...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social science & medicine (1982) 1998-11, Vol.47 (9), p.1263-1266
Main Authors: Baer, Roberta D., Garcia De Alba, Javier, Mares Leal, Rosa, Plascencia Campos, Ana Rosa, Goslin, Neill
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Ambulatory Care Facilities
Biological and medical sciences
Chemical and industrial products toxicology. Toxic occupational diseases
Child
Diarrhea - drug therapy
Diarrhea - ethnology
Disease
Empacho
Female
Folk Culture
Folk medicine
folk medicine lead poisoning Mexico
Folk sickness
Follow-Up Studies
Gastrointestinal disorders
Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice
Humans
Illness
Lead
Lead - therapeutic use
Lead Poisoning
Level of education
Low income
Male
Medical sciences
Medicine, Traditional
Metals and various inorganic compounds
Mexico
Mothers - education
Mothers - psychology
Socioeconomic Factors
Surveys and Questionnaires
Toxicology
Traditional Medicine
Treatment
Tropical medicine
Vomiting - drug therapy
Vomiting - ethnology
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Summary:This paper discusses research designed to investigate community, clinic, and longitudinal patterns in use of lead as a treatment for empacho, a folk illness manifest by gastrointestinal symptoms. The same questionnaire used in a clinic-based study seven years previously in Guadalajara, Mexico, was used to interview a randomly selected community sample; in addition, the study was repeated at the same clinic sites that had been studied previously. The goals were to investigate: (1) What are community wide prevalences of empacho and use of lead based remedies? (2) To what extent are current patterns of use of lead for treatment of empacho in clinic-based samples similar to those seven years ago. The attributable risk to the population as a whole from use of lead based remedies was found to be 11% of the households of Guadalajara. Essentially this same estimate was seen for the 1987 and 1994 clinic populations. Interestingly, while percentages of lead users have declined since 1987, twice as great a percentage of informants reported treating empacho. Other patterns originally identified in 1987 persisted in 1994; lead use continues to be associated with lower levels of parental education and income.
ISSN:0277-9536
1873-5347
DOI:10.1016/S0277-9536(98)00183-X