Introduction:

Alcoholism is a chronic disease that damages the organism, as well as family and social functioning, apart from being a cause of violence, antisocial behaviors, family disagreements, accidents, and even homicides.

Objective:

To assess the usefulness of applying an educational intervention program to modify the level of knowledge about alcoholism in residents from the community of Santa Rosa, Baracoa Municipality, Guantánamo Province, Cuba.

Methods:

A preexperimental before-and-after study was carried out. The study universe was made up of patients over eighteen years of age. A nonprobabilistic purposive sample of thirty patients was selected under the following inclusion criteria: to be physically and mentally fit, to be between nineteen and seventy years old, not to have any disabling morbid process, and to be willing to participate in the study.

Results:

There was a predominance of the male sex and ages between eighteen and twenty years. Before the educational intervention, 76.7 % had no knowledge about the consequences of alcohol consumption; after the intervention, this knowledge improved significantly. Of the total number of respondents, 76.6 % (23) had a low level of knowledge before the educational intervention, while 86.7 % were classified as having a high level of knowledge after the intervention. Only one adolescent was classified at a low level.

Conclusions:

The effectiveness of the educational intervention was evidenced, since it provided the necessary knowledge on topics related to alcoholism. The intervention strategy was proposed to be extended to all the inhabitants of the municipality.

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