In recent decades, Brazil has undergone several political, economic, social and cultural
changes that showed changes in quality of life, especially regarding health. The main
diseases affecting the Brazilians no longer became acute and chronic non-transmitted
diseases. The modification of nutritional habits accompanied that change, greatly
influencing the Brazilians’ diet. The dissemination of propaganda by the Brazilian media
and modern labor activities stimulates the consumption of foods high in fats, sugars and
carbohydrates, contributing to the increase in the percentage of overweight and obese
individuals in the world. According to the Ministry of Health the overweight’s Brazilian
population percentage increased from 42.7% to 48.1% in five years. It is considered that
Body Mass Index (BMI) between 25.0 and 29.9 means overweight. Studies in Applied
Behavior Analysis to the Health emphasizes techniques, especially focused on increasing
the rate of adherence to treatment. On the Nutritional area, these techniques help to
identify the environmental variables under which feeding behavior is under control. The
emphasis on self-observation and self-description provide the analysis and research of
control variables by the individual himself. Thus, the present study aimed to evaluate the
effectiveness of the presentation of justifications, in the form of a printed manual, on
report of adherence to nutritional instructions in overweight adults, as well as observing
the maintenance of this report through follow-up. Participated in this sample, nine
individuals enrolled in the Multiprofessional Project of Patients with Nutritional
Disorders, attended in the Hospital Universitário Bettina Ferro de Souza (HUBFS) of the
Universidade Federal do Pará (UFPA). These participants were divided into three study
conditions: Condition 1 (weekly monitoring with application of a manual containing
justifications for the following nutritional rules), Condition 2 (weekly application with
accompaniments 24-hours recall), Condition 3 (inquiry the medical records of patients
with unique monitoring by the HUBFS’ nutrition service. Have been associated
anthropometric data, body fat percentage and body folds to the Index of Reporting of
Adherence (IRA). Results showed that there was no difference in the indexes of
Adherence Reports obtained by participants of Condition 1 and condition 2. However,
we observed an increase in the IRA after intervention (compared with values observed in
baseline) and reduction in monitoring, regardless of the condition to which the participant
was exposed. Thus, the rates of reported adherence did not depend specifically on how
the allegations were presented, which were in written form and orally.
|
