Representações sociais da qualidade de vida de pessoas que vivem com HIV: um estudo comparativo intergrupos

Abstract

This study aimed to comparatively analyze social representations of quality of life (QOL) among people living with HIV in three municipalities in the state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This is a descriptive, exploratory study with a qualitative approach, based on the Theory of Social Representations, with a structural approach. The study included 384 people living with HIV in therapeutic follow-up in the SAE chosen for the study in the municipalities of Rio de Janeiro, Niterói and Macaé. Data were collected through the application of a socioeconomic questionnaire, from the Free Evocations of Words technique to the inductive term "quality of life". The data were organized by EXCEL software and analyzed using SPSS software 20.0, already the analysis of the data obtained from the application of the Free Word Evocations Technique was performed through the construction of the four-house chart, and was instrumented by the EVOC 2005 software. The results show that in the group studied the male sex predominated with 64,6%. The most prevalent age group is 40-50 years, which corresponds to 31%, followed by the age group of 29-39 years with 29%. Regarding the employment situation, 60% say they are employed or working in a regular or informal way. As for personal income, 30,7% of the participants have income between 1 and 2 wages. It should be highlighted that 13% of individuals say they do not have personal income. Regarding the use of ART, 90,6% reported regular use, and 23,7% used it for a period of 2 to 6 years. Regarding spirituality and religious ties, 29,2% of PVHA s declare themselves to be Catholics. The group shows that QOL is based on issues related to health care, good nutrition, treatment with medication and physical activity, and other health-promoting practices. We can conclude that the three groups share the same social representation, with content activated in various ways in response to the specific situations faced by the different groups of participants.