Social Representations on Diabetes Mellitus and Treatment: A Psycho-Sociological Research

Diabetes Mellitus (DM) is characterized by the oscillation of the rate of glucose in the body, causing biopsychosocial impacts on the lives of people affected by such a condition. In this sense, this study aimed to identify the social representations about Diabetes Mellitus and treatment, constructed by diabetic people. As many as 30 people, with ages ranging from 41 and 83 years old (M = 57.60, SD = 12.3) participated in the study, most of them male and married, who answered a sociodemographic questionnaire and a semi-structured interview. The data were submitted to the SPSS and IRAMUTEQ software, the results were analyzed through descriptive statistics, similarity analysis and word cloud. The representational field about the disease and treatment was anchored in the biomedical knowledge related to the concept, symptoms, comorbidities and treatment. Thus, the results point to the importance of an interdisciplinary approach that focuses on the psycho-sociological support, directed to the elaboration of public policies that enable psychoeducational actions with the intention of promoting the sensitization of diabetic people about characteristics of the affection and their behavioral attempts treatment