Description
In December 2014, a team of church members and associated healthcare workers from Owasso First Assembly in Owasso, Oklahoma, provided a free, two-day clinic and health assessment to the rural community of La Ceiba Dudu in Nicaragua. Services included medical exams, basic medications, dental extractions, and over the counter reading glasses. This report is a retrospective review of the patient records documented at that clinic. We analyzed the prevalence of parasites across five age cohorts and searched for correlations between parasite diagnosis and various patient metrics, including BMI, age, and gender. We searched for a relationship between occupants per household and the number of medical diagnoses and the average blood pressure of each occupant. We searched for a correlation between parasite diagnosis and gastroesophageal reflux, infection, allergies, and arthritis diagnoses. The study lacked power and thus the ability to decisively detect correlations at the α=0.05 significance level. However, average blood pressure correlated inversely to the number of occupants in the patient’s household (p=0.06), and parasite diagnosis correlated marginally with decreased BMI (p=0.07).
Keywords:
Health demographics, public health, parasites, medical mission trips, statistical analysis, rural community, Latin America
Department
Biology
Included in
2014 Health Demographics of a Rural Nicaraguan Community
In December 2014, a team of church members and associated healthcare workers from Owasso First Assembly in Owasso, Oklahoma, provided a free, two-day clinic and health assessment to the rural community of La Ceiba Dudu in Nicaragua. Services included medical exams, basic medications, dental extractions, and over the counter reading glasses. This report is a retrospective review of the patient records documented at that clinic. We analyzed the prevalence of parasites across five age cohorts and searched for correlations between parasite diagnosis and various patient metrics, including BMI, age, and gender. We searched for a relationship between occupants per household and the number of medical diagnoses and the average blood pressure of each occupant. We searched for a correlation between parasite diagnosis and gastroesophageal reflux, infection, allergies, and arthritis diagnoses. The study lacked power and thus the ability to decisively detect correlations at the α=0.05 significance level. However, average blood pressure correlated inversely to the number of occupants in the patient’s household (p=0.06), and parasite diagnosis correlated marginally with decreased BMI (p=0.07).
