AGING AND SOCIETY: SOCIAL CARTOGRAPHY OF THE EXPERIENCES OF SOCIAL SUBJECTS INVOLVED IN THE CAMINÁGUA PROJECT
Aging. Obesity. Social cartography of care. Physical exercise and health of the elderly. Change in weight-physical exercise in water. Caminágua Project.
An experience carried out in a public higher education institution is analyzed, as an extension Project Caminágua, linked to a Physical Education Course at a Health Sciences Center. Its goals are to provide overweight or elderly individuals in the community with university and extramural, physical activity offering minimal impact to the lower joints and spine, with a substantial loss of fat mass and gain in muscle mass. To develop the project, the Caminágua method was created with patent registration at the National Library (522,527); the method consists of a process of continuous movements (walking in the water = walking), with raising the knees, and alternating lateral raising of the legs, progressive jumps with the feet together, jumps using a single leg in an anteroposterior direction and pulling the water with the upper limbs extended and hands open. The research was developed by observing both the praxis (Karl Max; Paulo Freire) and the literature on the subject, in a dialectical view of the process, which made the theoretical framework and the collection of empirical data possible; it provided opportunities for the researcher's creative potential in the search for complementary information about the experience based on testimonies from participating social subjects, who performed a social cartography of care, complemented by statistical control of another portion of the studied population. The central issue is to monitor the performance of people with changes in body weight and elderly people during physical activity, measuring, at determined periods, a physical body diagnosis, in addition to capturing random statements with participating social subjects. The objectives are: a) to verify the effectiveness of the Caminágua Method; b) verify the efficiency of physical exercises, based on the results that were being evidenced by the studied population (research universe), especially with changes in body weight. As this is research involving human beings, the project was submitted to the institution's Ethics Committee, which judged its ethical merit, issuing a favorable opinion and specific certificate. It is ensured that the approach to the empirical data collected is based on a quantitative analysis of statistical data, followed by the qualitative compatibility of the results of the social cartography of care, generated by the social actors of the project. The Caminágua Project developed very dynamically given the recurring perspectives during the execution of the analysis, and that it was possible to observe, on site, the improvement in the health of those involved based on the positive results measured, which prove the effectiveness and efficiency of the Caminágua Method.