Counseling for physical activity in primary health care: An integrative review

Abstract

This study analyzes academic literature on counseling for physical activity in primary health care under Brazil’s Unified Health System (SUS). This is an integrative literature review conducted on content from the LILACS, MEDLINE, PubMed and SciELO databases published until December 2018. Twenty-two studies were analyzed, of which 13 were observational, seven were experimental and two were qualitative. The prevalence of counseling varied from 20% to 59,4% between studies and the profiles of counseled patients were observed (women, elderly people, patients diagnosed with chronic diseases). Counseling is most often provided by doctors, physically active people, those who feel able to counsel, and people who do not see lack of time as a barrier. Interventions had modest effects on patients’ physical activity levels and professionals’ counseling practices.