Características de la enfermedad de Hansen y contagio a familiares en El Oro. Estudio descriptivo.

Abstract

Introduction: The incidence of Hansen's disease registered in Ecuador is 0.71 per 10,000 inhabitants in 2006; it is within the global elimination parameter. The Province of El Oro still presents positive cases for the disease. Objective: To determine the characteristics of Hansen's disease in the Province of El Oro and diagnosis of the contagion to relatives. Material and Methods: It is a quantitative descriptive study which was carried out in the Province of El Oro in people who were diagnosed with Hansen's disease registered in the Epidemiology Center of this province in the period July 2012 to June 2013 and their relatives who were living with them. The sample of the lymph of the auricular pavilion and nasal swab for the diagnosis was made by means of the staining of Ziehl Neelsen and filling out a form. In the analysis of the information, a descriptive statistics were applied using the SPSS software. Results: A total of 32 patients with Hansen's disease were registered, 59.4% were lepromatous, 81.3% had skin lesions, the spots were 50% and the nodules were 12.5%. The preferred location of the lesions was the extremities. The 53.1% of the patients had loss of sensation in extremities. The 15.6% presented deformity and 9.4% presented disability due to illness. The 11.8% of the relatives presented a positive sputum smear test, of which 60% corresponded to the lepromatous subtype. Conclusions: There are still cases of Hansen in the province of El Oro and the contagion persists to relatives who live with the patients.