Suero Project: Making ORS with easy to obtain, locally available ingredients

Dehydration from diarrheal illnesses is one of the leading causes of death in the developing world. We have fewer diarrheal illnesses in the US (mostly due to clean water and food), but in places like Guatemala, gastrointestinal infections are very common. In order to prevent and treat dehydration for these people, oral rehydration solution (ORS), or as they say here, suero, is used. Suero isn't everyone's favorite thing to drink, but it can be life saving!

One of the things that Cody and I noticed at the clinic was that there is rarely enough suero to go around. We did the calculations, and it seemed like we were only giving out about a tenth of what we should be distributing. We often run low, despite the rather frequent pharmacy deliveries. The supply was clearly in need of some help.

Cody decided that we should try to make our own suero at the clinic. I could see that this was going to be big, so I asked him if I could help out on it, too. We looked into a few methods, and decided that it was feasible. In some parts of the world people make a very basic ORS out of sugar, salt, and clean water. This is pretty basic, and the World Health Organization (WHO) has specific guidelines about how to make an even better version. The only problem was, when we looked at the WHO recipe, it became clear that we were not going to be able to obtain a key ingredient: potassium chloride. We looked into various ways of buying it abroad, and getting it transported to the clinic with volunteers, but decided that wasn't a sustainable (or very feasible) option.

We looked into our possibilities here, and ways to get potassium into the suero. In some of my research I discovered that unrefined brown sugar actually has a lot of potassium in it. By chance, we were able to find a bag of ground panela, or piloncillo in a store. This artisanal product is not only flavorful and sweet, but also has a whole lot of vitamins and minerals in it. Cody worked closely with his friend Jonathan to come up with a recipe that would allow us to do the best we could with the ingredients we had available here.

In the end, we came up with a recipe for suero that we can make at the clinic! Through Willy's help at Cafe R.E.D. we were able to get in touch with a cooperative of local farmers, who grow panela organically. We now have a regional, organic source of panela, that we can purchase through an organization that we respect. We also got several pounds of salt and bicarbonate. All items are in containers at the clinic, and can easily be measured into liter-sized amounts of suero mix, and given to patients in little plastic bags.

And the best part is, Cody did the math, and it turns out that this recipe is 1/10 the cost of the old suero packets we were buying at the clinic! Now for the same cost, we can treat 100% of the patients who need suero, instead of just 1/10!

Cody has been working on writing up a report and presenting it to the clinic's board in both the US and Guatemala. But the reception at the clinic has been overwhelmingly positive.

Here we are showing off our supplies, about to teach people at the clinic how to mix up the batches of suero mix.