[Applicability of World Health Organization guidelines on self-care interventions for reproductive health in selected Latin American and Caribbean countriesAplicabilidade das diretrizes da Organização Mundial da Saúde sobre intervenções de autocuidado em saúde reprodutiva em países selecionados da América Latina e do Caribe].

Abstract

Objective: To analyze the applicability of the World Health Organization's WHO Guideline on self-care interventions for health and well-being in selected Latin American and Caribbean countries.

Methods: Countries prioritized by the Pan American Health Organization for technical cooperation in reproductive health were selected: Argentina, Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Honduras, Peru, and Uruguay. An exhaustive search was conducted for documents considered to be clinical practice guidelines on family planning, as well as other guidelines on related topics. Two simultaneous strategies were employed: a systematic search of published and indexed literature, and a gray literature search).

Results: The applicability of each recommendation on self-care for reproductive health is described for each country in a "traffic light" table, where green means "implemented", yellow means "in the implementation process", and red means "not implemented".

Conclusions: Favorable frameworks exist for interventions that promote the implementation of self-care strategies for sexual and reproductive health. The least developed thematic areas in the selected countries are: eliminating unsafe abortion and promoting sexual health. Only three countries in the Region of the Americas (Argentina, Colombia, and Uruguay) have laws that guarantee legal abortion and facilitate access to safe abortion. Although most countries in the Region do not guarantee the rights of transgender people, all countries except Guyana and Honduras provide hormones for them.