Browsing by Author "Egreja, Catarina"
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- Data protection in sociological health research: a critical narrative about the challenges of a new regulatory landscapePublication . Raposo, Hélder António; Melo, Sara; Egreja, CatarinaThe recent implementation of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) establishes a set of formal requirements that reinforce personal data protection, namely, those concerning the collection, treatment, and dissemination of data on research participants. With the application of this new legal provision at the European level, new types of restrictions are emerging, whose nature and reach intensify the tension between demands for privacy and scientific freedom in research. In this article, we take as a reference ongoing research taking place in Portugal, in the field of Sociology of Health, concerning the consumption of medicines by professionals exposed to high-performance pressure. Our main objective is to identify and analyse the implications of regulatory challenges faced in the research process and how the researchers managed and overcame them. We present a critical narrative that sheds light on the nature of the choices taken while also assessing the practical implications for the operationalisation of the research. We conclude by noting that, despite the benefits that may flow from the application of GDPR, the new requirements regarding the protection of personal data may override the ethical principles of scientific research and strengthen regulatory restrictions on conducting research. In the research concerned, the significant practical implications were indirect access to participants, a more time-consuming process in terms of participant adherence, and a temporal discrepancy between the different stages of recruitment.
- Nurses under pressure: the demands of professional performance and their management through the use of medicationPublication . Raposo, Hélder António; Egreja, Catarina; Lopes, NoémiaThis article discusses the relationship between the demands on nurses’ professional performance and adherence to the use of medicines and supplements for their management. This approach allows us to analyze the transformations of nursing work and how nurses use various natural and pharmaceutical resources to cope with the pressures they face in their professional activities. To understand the interconnection between the transformations in nursing work and what we refer to here as the process of pharmaceuticalisation of work contexts, we use the results of a sociological mixed methods study on the use of medicines and food supplements for managing professional performance. The results show some of the main pressure factors in nursing work and how the increase in professional pressure substantially affects performance-related medicine use, as these become more frequent when nurses perceive their work as more intense, demanding, and exposed to risks.
- Proteção de dados e anonimato: novos desafios metodológicos e éticos na investigação sociológica em saúdePublication . Raposo, Hélder António; Egreja, Catarina; Melo, SaraA investigação científica encontra-se, atualmente, enquadrada pelos mais recentes instrumentos normativos reguladores da proteção de dados. Desde 2018, com a aplicação do Regulamento Geral de Proteção de Dados (RGPD), adensam-se as questões relativas à proteção de dados pessoais dos sujeitos investigados, em particular os de natureza identificável ou sensível. Com efeito, este novo normativo jurídico alarga o âmbito de aplicação do conceito de dados pessoais, tornando muito mais restritiva a sua utilização, além de complexificar o seu processo de tratamento e livre circulação. Considerando a investigação em áreas específicas como a saúde, verifica-se que estes novos normativos vêm, de facto, reforçar a complexidade e a exigência de um panorama regulatório que já vinha estabelecendo, do ponto de vista da ética, diretrizes específicas. Em particular as que se referem à identificação, por parte das comissões de ética, das garantias relativas aos instrumentos e procedimentos que salvaguardam os direitos dos participantes nos processos de investigação. Centrando-nos num projeto em curso no âmbito da sociologia da saúde (PTDC/SOC-SOC/30734/2017) sobre consumo de medicamentos para a melhoria do desempenho em três grupos profissionais, focaremos alguns dos principais obstáculos e desafios éticos e metodológicos com que os investigadores se confrontaram, assim como as formas encontradas para os gerir ou ultrapassar. Além de exemplos práticos referentes a esta pesquisa - que recorre a uma triangulação de métodos de recolha de dados que inclui grupos focais, questionários e entrevistas – abordaremos, também, as ferramentas atualmente à disposição dos investigadores para ajudar a garantir a recolha e o tratamento “adequado” dos dados. Várias fases ao longo do trabalho de campo colocam questões particulares relacionadas com a ética e a proteção de dados que são cada vez mais desafiantes para as equipas, ao ponto de hoje se poder levantar a questão de fundo sobre o futuro e a viabilidade da investigação em sociologia tal como a conhecemos. Trata-se de um questionamento sério, que nos instiga a problematizar as implicações deste novo enquadramento e, sobretudo, a discernir que a especificidade das diferentes formas de investigação coloca distintos problemas éticos. É primordial fundamentar e demonstrar a demarcação da investigação sociológica em saúde face, nomeadamente, ao modelo da investigação clínica e biomédica que se constitui como a referência central que subjaz a muitos dos desenvolvimentos regulatórios. Os preceitos éticos atuais relativos às formas de garantir o anonimato ou a proteção dos participantes (presumindo-os como vulneráveis) podem ser, por isso, desajustados face a certas formas de investigação cujas estratégias metodológicas se baseiam em relações interpessoais e na consequente gestão de um património de confiança que se constrói entre os investigadores e os sujeitos.
- Work contexts and pharmaceuticalization: theoretical and empirical challengesPublication . Tavares, David; Lopes, Noémia; Egreja, CatarinaBased on empirical information obtained through an ongoing research project funded by the Portuguese national funding agency for science, research, and technology and in the (scarce) sociological literature on the subject, this communication proposes revisiting the dissemination of pharmaceuticalization. This will be achieved through a reflection on the theoretical and empirical challenges that arise from analysis and research on the relationship between organizational and professional transformations that have been verified in work contexts with implications on changes in the nature of work and the use of medicines, food supplements or others natural products by professionals to enhance their physical, intellectual and social performance (here designated as performance consumptions), within their workplace. This approach focuses on the analysis of the performance consumptions on the transformations of the professional work contexts, in different dimensions, such as the organization of work, technologization of the work process, standardization of professional tasks, the unpredictability of occurrences and work situations, new practices and routines, polyvalence and multifunction/multicompetence, extension and irregularity of schedules, an increase of workload together with the reduction of deadlines for completing tasks, new forms of relationship with the public. We propose to analyze how these changes, concerning the various aspects of the nature of work and the contextual conditions in which it is developed, marked by increasing pressure on work performance with consequent heightened demands on physical and/or cognitive/mental performance, lead to changes in strategies to manage performance. In particular, in the social practices and dispositions of adherence or resistance to the different types of natural and pharmaceutical resources, mobilized for the work performance expressed, for example, in memory enhancement, sleep management, weight loss, bodybuilding, combat physical and mental fatigue, anxiety control and ability to concentrate. The empirical support for this approach concerns three professional groups associated with contexts of high pressure for performance.