Training rural health staff for oral rehydration therapy in southern Sudan

From February 1980 to August 1982 a very definite change occurred in the treatment pattern for diarrhoea among the rural health staff in Torit and Kapoeta districts in Eastern Equatoria Province in Sudan. This paper describes a training and supervision programme for promoting use of ORT in diarrhoeal diseases and at the same time discouraging the use of sulphonamides in simple diarrhoea. In the training programme emphasis is put on increasing the knowledge of the health staff both about the medical facts and about communication with their communities. ORS as treatment for diarrhoea has been well accepted by the public, who consider the sugar/salt solution as "good medicine". The use of sulphonamides for diarrhoea has decreased from 75% to 22% of the diarrhoea cases, while use of ORS has increased from 7% to 72% of the diarrhoea cases.