Introduction:

The waters from health establishments are commonly used by officials and patients. To be acceptable for human use, water from establishments must meet microbiological criteria established in national standards.

Objective:

To determine the microbiological quality of water samples from sanitary establishments in the department of Caaguazú.

Methods:

A descriptive, observational, cross-sectional study was conducted in 104 samples of drinking and treated water from hospitals, family health units and health posts from the 22 districts of Caaguazú. These samples were studied to evaluate the microbiological quality of the water, total heterotrophs, total coliforms, thermotolerant coliforms, Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa were analyzed. Samples were processed by membrane filtration, rehydratable plates, conventional media, and miniaturized systems consisting of an application programming interface. They were classified as acceptable or unacceptable according to standard NP Nº 24-001-80.

Results:

Fifty eight (56%) samples, out of the 104, were acceptable and 46 (44%) were unacceptable. The causes of this last condition were the presence of total coliforms (42%), high count of heterotrophs (13%), presence of thermotolerant coliforms (11.5%), presence of Escherichia coli (9.6%) and presence of Pseudomonas aeruginosa (2%).

Conclusions:

Most of the water samples were assessed to be acceptable in microbiological quality; however, since a considerable percentage of unacceptable samples and the presence of species such as Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa were detected, it is recommended to correct the water treatment techniques emphasizing microbiological quality controls in the health centers studied.

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