Representações sociais sobre o câncer de próstata segundo homens em atendimento oncológico

Abstract

Prostate cancer is one of the most frequent diseases, with high rates of morbidity and mortality, due to diagnosis and treatment in the advanced stage of the disease. The cultural historical construction of the ideals of masculinity, the stigma of the disease and preventive tests and the adverse effects of treatment have corroborated this panorama, which makes it essential to understand the perception of man about prostate cancer. This study aimed to understand the social representations about prostate cancer according to men undergoing oncological treatment and/or follow-up. This is a field research, with a qualitative approach, of the type Social Representation research, anchored in the theoretical-methodological framework of the Social Representations and the Discourse of the Collective Subject. It was carried out in an outpatient clinic of high oncologic complexity in the South of Minas Gerais, with 30 men, diagnosed with prostate cancer, undergoing treatment and/or follow-up. Data collection through interviews and medical records. Quantitative data analyzed by descriptive and qualitative statistics by collective subject discourse. There was a predominance of men aged 70-79 years (46.67%), brown skin color (43.33%), married (60%), with incomplete elementary education (60%), Catholics (70%), practitioners (73.33%), living in the urban area (90%), who lived with a partner (33.33%), with three living children (23.33%), without caregiver’s monitoring (86.67%), retired (80%), with monthly income of one to three minimum wages (83.33%), who denied alcohol consumption (63.33%) , and smoking (50%), with primary cancer located in the prostate (96.67%), with time of diagnosis for more than 12 months (80%), without metastasis (76.67%), with local extension (70%), who underwent radiotherapy (86.66%). Data analysis was constructed of the model of social representations from the meanings of prostate cancer for the collective subject: Perceptions, Sensations, Experiences; Feelings; Knowledge; Behaviors, Attitudes and reactions and their central ideas and absolute frequency: "Thing that does not hurt" (5), "Nothing, something normal" (9), "Disturbed sex" (9), "This has no cure" (4), "A curable disease"(8), "Worry, fear, annoyance and sadness"(8), "Learning for life"(7), "Surprise and Scare"(6), "Something bad, difficult, serious, intense, dangerous, which ends life and kills"(11), "Shame"(2), "Disease that did not shake, it was faced without fear"(10). The social representations that emerged about prostate cancer allowed the understanding that it is a collective phenomenon that influences the individual elaboration of concepts, values, beliefs and behavior before the disease process. Socialized language allowed men to attribute to prostate cancer representations that denoted difficult experiences in coping with the disease and treatment. Understanding these social representations and appropriating the identification of the various emerged functions that, associated with scientific knowledge, allows developing a philosophy of care to meet the complex demands of men for health education actions and clinical management, in a contextualized and integrated perspective.