O ensino da atividade física para a saúde no currículo dos cursos de medicina: o panorama brasileiro.

Abstract

The importance of physical activity as a strategy for improving the population's quality of life. However, studies report that advice on this subject from doctors is low, point to specific lack of knowledge in the area as being one of the main barriers. Authors therefore indicate that the appropriate time for teaching this information would be throughout graduation. The aim of the present study is to describe the presence of content related to "physical activity" and / or "physical exercise" in the curricula of Brazilian medical courses. This is a descriptive study, of the census type, carried out through document analysis available online, on the websites institutional aspects of medical courses in the country. We identified 233 medical courses functioning, according to the Ministry of Education and Culture. In 67.8% (n = 158) of the courses, it was possible to evaluate the curriculum content based on the material available. It was observed that 12% of the courses present in their grades curricula, menus or pedagogical project, content related to "activity physical activity "and / or" physical exercise ". We also find that this teaching is more frequent in courses belonging to public education institutions when compared to the private network (21.5% vs. 5.4%; p = 0.002). Teaching about Physical activity in Brazilian medical courses is low, the need to adapt curricula to relevant topics such as the benefits physical activity at the individual and population level, since physicians have, in their professional role, fundamental importance in health promotion collective.