Profile and performance of nutritionists in Primary Health Care

Abstract

A B S T R A C T ObjectiveTo describe the profile and performance of nutritionists in Primary Health Care. MethodsA cross-sectional study was carried out, and all nutritionists in two municipalities of Paraíba, Brazil, were interviewed. Information was collected through structured interviews on demographic characteristics, professional qualification, development of food and nutrition activities, knowledge and use of essential bibliography for the work in Primary Care. ResultsIn one municipality there were 28 teams of the Family Health Strategy and in the other, nineteen teams. In all, nineteen nutritionists were interviewed, fourteen of whom were working in the health teams and five were working exclusively in the Family Health Support Centers. All but one were women and the majority were between 20 and 39 years; the majority (n=10) had no graduate training. Nutritionists from the basic health teams developed more public health nutrition actions, such as defining nutritional care protocols and vitamin A and iron supplementation than those from the Family Health Support Centers (11 versus 1; and 13 versus 1, respectively). About half were satisfied with work in general, and dissatisfaction was related to deficiencies in the availability and quality of anthropometric equipment, physical structure and material. ConclusionNutritionists work in food and nutrition actions in collective health, emphasizing the importance of qualification and practices that better combine the programmatic agenda of this area with Primary Care.

Scientific production of Nutrition courses in Food and Nutrition in Collective Health: contributions to the debate on professional performance

“…This assumption agrees with reports found in the literature about the low use of support materials by these professionals at work in primary care such as the Matrix of food and nutrition actions in primary care and the National Primary Care Policy (Aguiar & Costa, 2015;Figueroa Pedraza & Santos, 2017). Also, a study carried out with nutritionists in the city of São Paulo indicates the perception of insufficient practical activities and discussions on Collective Health and health policies during graduation (Vieira & Cervato-Mancuso, 2015).…”

Programa Nacional de Suplementação de Vitamina A: educação alimentar e nutricional no contexto da Atenção Primária à Saúde

“…O apoio insuficiente para a realização das ações de EAN por parte do serviço municipal de saúde e da comunidade é preocupante, uma vez que um importante fator que favorece a efetividade de intervenções de EAN é o apoio da gestão do local de trabalho 24 , e a fragilidade de apoio da comunidade pode levar à baixa adesão de ações educativas, como identificado pelos profissionais entrevistados. Figueroa Pedraza e Santos 25 , ao investigarem o perfil e a atuação de nutricionistas na APS, encontraram que 53% desses profissionais estavam satisfeitos com o vínculo com a secretaria de saúde dos municípios e 79% estavam satisfeitos com o relacionamento com a comunidade.…”

Clock hours of food and nutrition education in curricula of undergraduate nutrition programs: a two-country comparison

“…Among the main professional practice areas, Public Health had the smallest number of CHI. The number of nutritionists working in the National Health Service in Portugal and the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS, Unified Health System) in Brazil is smaller than what is considered adequate and may have a relevant effect on the nutritionists' training [21][22][23]. The biologist approach, or "nutritionism", when food is understood as its nutrient profile at the expense of its social, human, and symbolic context, seems to prevail [24].…”