THE PROFILE OF CAREGIVERS FOR THE INSTITUTIONALIZED ELDERLY

Introduction: According to the Brazilian Ministry of Health, 40% of the elderly population needs assistance to perform at least one instrumental activity of daily living. Thus, as the institutionalized elderly have greater dependence, questions must be raised how empowered the caregivers from these institutions are for the most diverse functions required everyday. Objectives: Knowing the profile of caregivers of institutionalized elderly people and to identify the level of qualification and satisfaction of this group. Method: It was applied a questionnaire with twelve to eighteen objective questions to caregivers that work in Long Term Care Institution St. Vincent de Paul in Araguari – MG. Results and conclusions: 100% are the caregivers are female which agrees with Ribeiro et. al. (2008) which states that most caregivers are women, and in this study 39% work by vocation and 61% by financial interest. In addition, in relation to the professional qualification it was observed that the majority held course for elderly caregiver and / or Medium Level Professional Licensing in Nursing Technician. In this sense, it has assembled a contingency table in which we applied the Fisher exact test, relating the level of satisfaction with the professional qualification. Colomé et. al. (2011) report that the level of satisfaction is higher in qualified caregivers, contrasting our review, from Fisher‘s exact test which showed that the level of significance of 5%, with p> α, it is accepted Ho. Although most have chosen this job by financial interest, the research showed that they are satisfied with their work.