Health promotion in a northeastern quilombola population - analysis of an educational intervention

Objective:

The aim was to develop an educational intervention in health for quilombola communities, providing guidance on the genetic risk for having children with sickle cell anemia (SCA), the oral manifestations of the disease, general notions of self-care, and genetic counseling.

Methods:

The pre-intervention sample was 267 individuals, of whom 230 attended the post-intervention phase. A questionnaire was applied pre- and post-intervention and frequency distribution was calculated and analyzed using the Chi-square test, considering a significance level of p < 0.05.

Results:

Pre-intervention, 72.3% of respondents did not know about SCA or its trait and 94.8% did not know the form of transmission; post-intervention, the latter index decreased to 32.6%, 60% reported having heard about the theme and 36.1% claimed to know about the subject.

Conclusion:

The intervention was positive and effective, and demonstrated the importance of offering quilombola communities a permanent health education and genetic counseling program.

Anemia, Sickle Cell; Genetic counseling; Health education; African Continental Ancestry Group