TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION AND EDUCATION: TELECONSULTATIONS IN PROFESSIONAL TRAINING IN FAMILY HEALTH

Distance Education on the web has become an important tool for the training of health professionals. In Brazil, the use of online Distance Education represents an essential instrument for the Ministry of Health (MS) to promote permanent education actions through the Open University of the Unified Health System (UNA-SUS), consisting of a network of public universities at national level. Thus, innovative pedagogical proposals are made possible by the use of Digital Information and Communication Technologies (DICT), capable of democratize and expand the educational offer for the public that works in the health sector, thus providing open and permanent education, as can be observed in different Brazilian government programs and actions, especially the Brazilian National Telehealth Network Program (Telessaúde Brasil Redes), Telemedicine University Network (Rede RUTE) and UNA-SUS. As a member of the actions of the MS, the Center of Technologies and Distance Education in Health of the Faculty of Medicine of Universidade Federal do Ceará (NUTEDS/FAMED/UFC) provides training in the Family Health Strategy (ESF) in the state of Ceará. This work aims to present a sample of these strategies, referring specifically to the use of teleconsulting, from the Telehealth Program, in the training of specialists in the Specialization, Research and Innovation Course in Family Health (CEPISF), offered by NUTEDS to professionals of the Program “More Doctors for Brazil” (PMMB), one of the priority programs of the MS for primary care. The methodology is based on the analysis of the reports of experience, as well as on the study of the reports produced by the system of teleconsulting, and the records on the tele-education actions carried out in CEPISF. In conclusion, it is important to use technological and pedagogical innovation tools in the context of health, in order to promote the encouragement of permanent education and the knowledge of care practices based on the best evidence available and on the use of teleconsulting as support, avoiding the unnecessary geographical displacement of users of the Unified Health System (SUS), increasing the capacity of health problems solving by the teams, as well as contributing to the guarantee of the integrality of care when favoring the referral of cases that need care from other levels of assistance.