Social Engagement Service in Dimension of Health Care for keeping up with the Prevention and Control of Parasitic Disease Project at Wat-Yang-Ngam School for Primary School Children

March 19, 2021

The staff of the School of Medicine, Walailak University together with the Center of Academic Service organized a project for the control and prevention of helminths in primary school children at Wat Yang Ngam School.  

The project is one of the University’s academic missions for social dimensions of health in Tha Sala district, Nakhon Si Thammarat that have been done continuously in 2020 the second year with kind cooperation with Mr. Charan Phetpheng, the Director of Wat Yang Ngam School. The school has expressed an intention to promote the health quality of their 103 students in kindergarten and a primary class of Grade 1-6.

Eighty-one students have been surveyed by questionnaire on their risk behaviors for infection with soil-transmitted helminth (STH). The nail and stool samples from all students had been diagnosed with parasitic contamination and infection.

In addition, on March 19, 2021, the project’s staff educated the primary students about the prevention and control of helminth disease.

The context was about to raise up the consideration of awareness of helminths transmitted through the soil as well as being able to apply the gained knowledge to correct their risk behavior (i.e. hand washing, touching pets, washing vegetables, cleaning and cooked food, defecating in unhygienic toilets, wearing shoes, and biting fingernails). Then the students could expend the benefits from learning from school to their family and community that leading to the development of a model area for controlling the spread of helminths at the community level in a sustainable way.