The Latino Patient – Health Attitudes, Beliefs, and Practices

¡Abrígate Bien!

One of the many historical attitudes towards health that is held by many Latinos is known as the Hot and Cold Theory. This theory claims that the body has four different fluids of different textures and temperatures:

Blood- hot and wet

Yellow Bile- hot and dry

Phlegm- cold and wet

Black Bile- cold and dry

In this pattern of thinking, a balance in the body among the four types is seen when a person is healthy. A sick person experiences an imbalance among the fluids. According to this theory, temperature plays a big role in the health state of individuals. For example, to lower the temperature of the body, a person may be offered a cool drink. On the other hand, drinking warm liquids and consuming warm foods such as tea or soup is thought to help an individual with a cold.

 I have seen practices similar to this in the belief patterns of nearly every Peruvian person I have met. They all seem to 100% believe the wives' tale that if you are cold, you will catch a cold. It is almost humorous how frequently I am told to “Abrígate Bien,” or “Dress warm.” The temperature here is not exceptionally cold on most days. Usually the temperature ranges somewhere from 55 to 75 degrees, but the people here usually dress as if they were living in the arctic! In the clinic, many of the nurses and ladies wear multiple layers of clothing, including warm jackets and scarves, for the entire day. On multiple different occasions, I have been working in the health center in just my short sleeved shirt and constantly am asked if I am cold. I usually proceed to explain that it is much, much colder where I am from and so I don’t feel so cold here. In addition to this, a few people have sternly told me that I need to dress warm or I am going to get sick and then the whole clinic will be sick. Since then, I have worn at least a long sleeved shirt on most occasions.

The need to dress warm especially applies to the babies who are brought into the health center. When they come in, I always tell the mothers to undress the baby so that we can properly record the weight and height. The undressing process usually is quite lengthy as the babies are typically wrapped in two or three blankets and clothed in several layers of jackets, sweaters, and shirts, complete with socks, gloves, and hats. Sometimes the babies are actually damp with what I presume to be sweat by the time all the layers are removed.

I find it really interesting that even the educated professionals working in the public health center find it so important to dress warm all the time. One time the head nurse working with the babies got mad at a mom for leaving her baby undressed and exposed to the cold for too long. She lectured the mother about how her baby was going to get sick. The same nurse has lectured me about the same thing on a few occasions as well.