FACING ALCOHOLISM IN A COMMUNITY: EXPERIENCE IN A FAMILIAR APPROACH

Introduction and objective: The abusive consume of alcohol is one of the most harmful elements of today health worldwide. The problematic use of this substance appears in a top ten list of health problems that need to be prioritized by the Family Health Program of Brazilian government. It’s well kown that the family has a fundamental role in the treatment process of any chemical dependence. In a comunity analyzed by medicine students from Universidade Positivo, using the Participatory Rapid Appraisal, it’s been identified a high prevalence of families that have alcohol dependents. Based on this, an intervention was proposed using the concept of health education, so that relatives could obtain more information about the problem and the resources available for medical and psychological assistance. Method: The recruitment of relatives interested was made by Community health workers. Five meetings of one hour each were programmed, without the dependents, in the community health center. The proposal was to promote an exchange of experiences after a short explanation of a topic by a skilled professional invited to mediate the conversation. They approached topics related to the alcoholic enviroment: codependency, support groups, dealing with the dependent, situations of violence and treatment. Result and conclusions: Despite being a serious problem in the community, there was no regular adherence and the project did not go on. However, the experience exceeded its purpose in alerting the worrying prevalence of the disease, its consequences within the family, and most important, the need to find new ways of intervention.