Desafios da prática do autocuidado do idoso portador de diabetes mellitus tipo 2

Abstract

During the course of the societies' history, the greatest scourges linked to health surveillance resulted from intrinsic factors to the construction of communities, which shows an intimate relationship between health and environmental conditions. The look of biomedicine on human health focus on corrective solutions over preventive ones, because it follows the Cartesian thought with the traditional diagnosis and prophylaxis, conditioned by the commercialization of scientific knowledge. With the purpose of fosteDiabetes Mellitus has become a major public health challenge and is associated with the adoption of inadequate lifestyle, especially poor diet and sedentary lifestyle. The objective of this study was to identify the challenges of the self-care practice of the elderly with type 2 Diabetes Mellitus. This is a descriptive study, with a quantitative approach, carried out with 14 elderly people from a Basic Health Unit in the northern state of Minas Gerais. Data were collected between March and April 2016 by means of a questionnaire. The results showed that the majority were female (57.0%), aged 60-80 years (86.0%), illiterate (50.0%), brown (57.0%), married or widowed (86.0%), they live with companions (50.0%), retired (100%) with income of up to 01 minimum wage (50%). It was evidenced that 100.0% of the elderly carried out drug treatment and 79.0% the monitoring of glycemia as selfcare practices. Participants are not smokers or alcoholics, but only 21.0% adhere to the regular practice of physical activity. The difficulty of reading (71.0%), high cost of medications prescribed by the physician (43.0%) and difficulty in getting to the Health Unit (43.0%) were observed among the difficulties pointed out for self-care practice. It is concluded that it is necessary to raise awareness among the elderly and health professionals about the benefits of physical activity. The creation of groups for the coexistence of elderly people for related activities and the provision of physical space suitable for physical activities can be motivating strategies for this public and should be planned and made feasible by the health services. Home visits, family responsibility for the treatment of the elderly, and health education actions can positively contribute to the adoption of self-care, and should be strategies for health promotion, considering the vulnerabilities of the elderly diabeticring a critical reflection about the health-disease process, this study defends the need of a paradigm shift concerning biomedicine, defending a break on the hegemony and monopoly of the traditional medicine to mitigate prejudices and allow different therapeutic to the sick. (English) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]