Understanding of popular health education by a Family Health Strategy team

Abstract

Introduction: Popular Health Education (PHE), based on Paulo Freire, seeks to recognize and confront health problems through dialogue with popular classes, respect for different cultures and recognition of the diversity of knowledge. Objective: to analyze the knowledge about PHE of nurses and community health agents (CHA) of the Family Health Strategy of a Primary Health Care Unit (PCU) in Fortaleza, Ceará. Method: Qualitative study conducted by semi-structured interview applied to four nurses and four CHA of PCUs in order to analyze participants’ understanding about PHE. The findings were categorized according to Minayo’s Thematic Analysis. Results: most professionals have worked between two and ten years in the service. Some of them know the basic concepts of PHE, but do not explicitly apply them on a daily basis. Most of them reported lack of time for consultations, maintenance and construction of groups and financial difficulty to purchase materials for PHE activities. Lack of humanization and biomedical and curative focus were cited. Conclusion: Most important actions of Popular Health Education are developed by the initiative of professionals, even without much basis and direction on the subject, given the lack of a specific protocol of workflow for conducting practices in the scope of PHE.