Avaliação das atividades dos enfermeiros da saúde da família na atenção à saúde da criança de zero a dois anos em três municípios do Ceará

Abstract

The study has the objective of evaluating the activities of nurses involved in the Family Health strategy in the care of children aged zero to two in three municipalities in Ceará. The participants were 81 (eighty-one) FH nurses working in the municipalities of Fortaleza, Cascavel and Quixeramobim, Ceará. The data was collected between the period of November 2003 and May 2004, using a descriptive, quantitative approach, using primary data. A questionnaire with open and closed questions was used. The data was entered and processed in the Epi-Info 6.04 Program and tested statistically with qui squared (c2) and the Fisher Freeman Halton p. According to the results it was possible to identify that: 92.5% of the nurses are female; 78.0% have worked in Family Health for less than 5 years and 49.4% worked in the FH Program in another municipality before being hired by the administration in this exercise. The specialization course in Family Health was taken by 75.0% of the nurses; 47.0% attended training on Breastfeeding Counseling and Integral Care of Diseases Prevalent in Infancy (AIDPI); 60.5% of interviewees who work in municipalities in the interior attended the AIDPI (p=0.001). 53.2% carried out their first nursing appointment 30 days after the child’s birth; 70.0% introduce themselves by name before the nursing appointment (p=0,020). The nurses do not usually worry about the presence of the father or grandmother at the appointment, although they do “sometimes”, giving a significance of p=0.006 and p=0.046, respectively. 38.0% do not organize groups for pregnant women at the Health Centre or in the community. In addition, 79.0% do not organize groups for puerperal women to advise them on the care of the child (p=0,015); only 50.6% carried out home visits during the first post-partum week. The positive aspects of Family Health pointed out by the nurses were: “Involvement with the community/good relationship with the families”, “Working in a team” and “Support and recognition of the nurses work buy the administration” and the “Dedication and involvement of the nurse in their work”. The negative aspects were: “the lack of infrastructure and material for the work” and “the excessive number of families for each team”. The study proved to be relevant in as much as it deepened and reviewed the practices that influence the process of care for children ad their families, compared with what has been established by the Ministry of Health. The hypothesis H1, that there exists a significant difference between the attributions of nurses established by the Ministry of Health for the care of children under two and the daily activities of nurses working in FH was confirmed. Nurses should give priority to give competence to be more humane, envisioning reception, such as dialogue practices, which above all, are centered on the care of the child.