Barefoot doctoring: an alternative approach for eliminating pharmaceutical drug pedlary in rural Nigeria

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Periodical article

Title:	Barefoot doctoring: an alternative approach for eliminating pharmaceutical drug pedlary in rural Nigeria
Author:	Moloye, Olugbemi
Year:	1991
Periodical:	African Notes: Bulletin of the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan
Volume:	15
Issue:	1-2
Pages:	113-118
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Nigeria
Subjects:	public health rural areas health personnel
Abstract:	Historical reasons and the perpetuation of the inherited colonial tradition with respect to the health care delivery system, as well as deficient community and multisectoral involvement in the planning and implementation of Nigeria's health scheme, and an inadequate stock of drugs, have led to a proliferation of pharmaceutical drug peddlers, especially in rural Nigeria. In view of the dangers posed by unprofessional drug dispensers, in particular in the rural areas, the author suggests that drug peddlers should be recruited, trained and made to work alongside community health workers as 'barefoot doctors', in the hope of reducing the menace posed by their untrained activities. At present, the use of community health workers in rural communities is inadequate; the recruitment and training of drug peddlers as barefoot doctors would go a long way towards eliminating the shortcomings of the present primary health care programme in rural Nigeria. Ref.