A formação do nutricionista para atuação no Sistema Único de Saúde

Abstract

The dietitian is a generalist professional, acting in all areas of knowledge that food and nutrition are critical to the promotion, maintenance and recovery of health and prevention of diseases of individuals or population groups. According to the National Curriculum Guidelines (DCN – Diretrizes Curriculares Nacionais), you must allow that the proposed curricula are able to develop academic and professional profile with competencies, skills and content, relevant and consistent with national approaches to ensure the performance quality, efficiency and resoluteness, at the National Health System (SUS – Sistema Único de Saúde). This study aimed to analyze the dietitian’ professional formation, in the perspective of their performance in the National Health System. This research has a qualitative nature and the study population consists of the coordinators of nutrition courses in the universities of the State of São Paulo, whose courses have begun before 1988. This study was conducted in two stages: data collection through documentary analysis of the DCNs and the Courses Pedagogical Projects (PPC – Projetos Pedagógicos de Cursos), through a matrix of analytical categories, and semi-structured interviews with the coordinators of the nutrition courses. The interviews were composed by questions about the education of students to act in the SUS and issues relating the courses PPC with the DCN. The interviews were analyzed with the content analysis technique, thematic defined by Minayo. In compliance with the Resolution 466/2012 of the National Health Council, the research was approved by the Ethics Committee on Human Beings Research of the UFSCar and all individuals signed the Free and Informed Consentment Term (TCLE - Termo de Consentimento Livre e Esclarecido). From the nine Nutrition courses that suit to the study inclusion criteria, six courses made their PPC available. The analysis of PPC in the light of DCN demonstrated general suitability with some comments on the more traditional evaluation methods and greater emphasis to health care competencies in detriment to the competencies related to management and education. All PPC analyzed include the health needs and the formation of nutritionists emphasizing the SUS. The interviews were fundamental to verify, with the coordinator or their representatives, the challenges for the PPPs implementation in practice, such as : the involvement of the entire faculty, the organization of the course within the University, maintenance of program content within reduced workload and the qualification of teachers in Public Health Area. It was also identified gaps in the introduction of students and graduates in their actuation field in the SUS: lack of hiring of professionals involved in Health Network and deals with the city governments, as partners in the responsibility of training of professionals and implementation of PPC. It is clearly observed the importance of providing students with a curriculum that addresses the relationship between teaching-research-extension, in order to approximate the student to the job market. But this articulation does not occur effectively when we focus the SUS as acting field.