Estudo de prevenção e controle da COVID-19: percepção e práticas no cotidiano das orientações médico-científicas adotadas pelos trabalhadores da saúde da Atenção Primária à Saúde no município de São Luís

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, health workers experienced the process of fear of the unknown, especially due to the spread and false information about disease prevention and control measures, generating negative impacts on daily life. Thus, it was necessary to understand the meanings of prevention and information about COVID-19 in the dynamics of these professionals' lives. OBJECTIVE: To analyze how PHC health workers perceive and translate COVID-19 prevention and control measures into everyday practices at the individual, family and collective levels. METHODOLOGY: Study with a cross-sectional, quanti-qualitative approach. Held in three territories covered by Primary Health Care in the city of São Luís, Maranhão. The sample consisted of 70 health workers, data collection took place in two stages, in the first a semi-structured questionnaire was applied and in the second stage a dialogue interview was carried out with 20% of the sample. The data analysis of the first stage took place through the construction of percentages, graphs and tables, for the second stage, content analysis was used through the Iramuteq software. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The analysis of communication strategies and information about COVID-19 showed that most participants received information about hand washing (95.7%), mask use (90%) and use of alcohol gel ( 86%), total social isolation (62.8%) and partial social isolation (58.5%). The most reliable source of information came from health professionals in the territory (70%), 41.5% reported being very confident in preventive measures. When asked about the measures adopted, the use of gel alcohol (97.1%) prevailed, followed by the use of a mask (92.9%) and hand hygiene (91.4%). In the qualitative analysis of the research, Iramuteq emerged with 4 categories: changes in the lives of individuals and families; credibility in the information; PHC performance during the pandemic and family and community strategies. In the analysis of similarity, it was observed that the word tree presented three central cores from which the ramifications emerged with the following highlighted words: “find, work, must, contribute, need, accompany, invest alone, talk, disappear, believe, fake news, disrupt and whatsapp”. The word cloud analysis was in agreement with the findings in the similarity analysis. CONCLUSION: The research showed that the health workers attributed a degree of credibility to the information received about the prevention and control measures of the disease and that it directly reflected in the daily practice, it is concluded that the informational universe related to the prevention and control measures control of COVID-19 accessed by PHC health workers is expressed in the adoption of preventive strategies and a lower risk of contamination FINAL CONSIDERATIONS: The pandemic has brought changes to the daily lives of these professionals, it is recommended to study and implement care strategies biopsychosocial benefits to be offered to this part of the population that has dedicated so much to fighting the pandemic.