Community intervention to modify attitudes of at-risk populations towards patients with leprosy
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21984807Keywords:
leprosy; social stigma; health knowledge, attitudes, practice; community-based intervention; health education; social discriminationAbstract
Introduction: rejection towards leprosy patients is based on limited knowledge and understanding of the disease; hence, the importance of implementing strategies that help reduce the stigma it generates.
Objective: to evaluate a community intervention strategy that contributes to modifying rejecting and discriminatory attitudes of the population at risk for leprosy towards patients diagnosed with the disease.
Method: a pre-experimental study, with pre-test and post-test, conducted in 67 patients who make up the population at risk for leprosy in the El Asiento community, Chambas, during the period 2024–2025. The reliability of the instrument and the Wilcoxon signed-rank test were applied.
Results: instrument reliability was 0.896. Regarding the level of knowledge about leprosy, during the pre-test, the Very low and Low levels predominated (curability 46.2%, clinical manifestations 58.2%, transmission 56.7%, disability prevention 52.2%); after the intervention, the levels rose significantly to Very high and High. Regarding attitude in the pre-test, acceptance was at a Low level (64.2%) and rejection was at a High level; there was a significant change in the post-test, reducing rejection to Very low and Low levels and acceptance predominating at Very high and High levels. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test yielded statistically significant results.
Conclusions: the community intervention strategy was effective in modifying rejecting and discriminatory attitudes towards leprosy patients.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Tania Alemán Martínez, Meilin García Jaime, Onesio Esteban de León Gutierrez, Daniela María Hernández Alemán, Leidy Lorena González Gómez
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