QUALITIES OF AN IDEAL VOLUNTEER COMMUNITY MALARIA WORKER - A COMPARISON OF THE OPINIONS OF COMMUNITY RESIDENTS AND NATIONAL MALARIA SERVICESTAFF

Since the late 1950s, most malaria surveillance and treatment in rural areas of Latin America has been carried out by networks of unpaid com munity malaria workers, known as Volunteer Collaborators, who are sele cted and supervised by staff of the national malaria services (NMSs) i n each country. In spite of the free and readily accessible antimalari al treatment available at these Volunteer Collaborator posts, many res idents continue to seek treatment elsewhere and in most cases take dos es of antimalarials that are insufficient to cure their infections. To identify ways in which the Volunteer Collaborator Network could be ma de more attractive to residents and to improve the process of selectio n of new workers, we asked community residents and Guatemalan NMS work ers to rank order, according to their importance, 11 qualities or char acteristics of an 'ideal' volunteer malaria worker. Community resident s preferred someone who is available to take care of patients at all t imes of the day, is a responsible person, and has a general knowledge of medicine. No significant differences were noted in the rank orders of male and female residents or literate and illiterate residents. Nat ional Malaria Service workers also preferred someone who takes care of patients at all times of the day, even when busy. In addition, they w anted individuals who recognize the importance of their work as a Volu nteer Collaborator, but choosing volunteers who had a general knowledg e of medicine was not important. By modifying the procedures used to s elect Volunteer Collaborators so as to identify candidates with the qu alities preferred by residents, it should be possible to increase acce ptance and improve the performance of these volunteer workers.