Perfis de autocuidado e adesão ao regime medicamentoso em idosos de centros de dia da cidade do Porto

Abstract

The aging population and consequent increase in demand for social support anwsers for the elderly was the starting premise for our research. Given the individual vulnerabilities of the elderly attending Day Centers and focusing on the potentially sensitive human anwsers to nursing care, specifically self-care and functional capacity to manage the drug regime, we conducted a study, observational and descriptive, with people age 65 or older, enrolled in the Porto City Day Centres, with the objective to characterize the profiles of prevalent self-care, the phenomenon of adherence to the medication regimen and verify the existence of relations between both that lead in the future, the implementation of Nursing prescriptions. The 60 elderly who attended showed a very aged sample, low education and social support and cognitive decline signals. It was possible to identify several factors of vulnerability due to the management of the drug regime, fed by events such as the strong prevalence of polypharmacy, the complexity of the prescribed regimen, the existence of inappropriate prescriptions for the elderly, functional decline in terms of mobility and cognition that requires the presence of caregivers, and the lack of economic resources to purchase drugs. Relatively to profiles, in addition to a greater prevalence of "undefined" profile, in a expected way, one finds that the only become evident was the profile "formally guided" characteristic of people resigned to the functional decline associated with aging and deposit in other decisions about their own care. Maybe that's why the phenomenon of non-adherence to medication regimen, understood as an intentional behavior of not taking the drugs as a prescription, it has rarely been observed, since most have delegated in family or Day Centres caregivers the decision of managing the medication. Given the above, considering the times of numerous social changes, political and economic reforms, it is essential a transition of health care to the community. We believe that nurses have a crucial role in promoting self-care, increasing independence and individual responsibility of these elderly populations. It is necessary, therefore, continue studies to delineate the functional profile of these people and define the therapeutic potential of Nursing according to experienced transitions.

Date of Award	6 Dec 2018
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Luís Sá (Supervisor) & Armando Almeida (Co-Supervisor)