Social network and Family Health Strategy: meanings produced by communitarian agents and implications to the practice

• Grant number: 10/04227-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: August 01, 2010
• End date: March 31, 2012
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Psychology - Social Psychology
• Principal Investigator: Carla Guanaes Lorenzi
• Grantee: Ricardo Lana Pinheiro
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (FFCLRP). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Ribeirão Preto , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This project is going to be developed in the context of the Family Health Program (FHP), one of the main strategies of the primary health care in Brazil, in which the Communitarian Health Agents' (CHA) work is considered central to its good development. Some studies discuss that the formation and work of the CHA have been carried out based on biomedical references. However, we consider that the concept of "social network" can contribute to the construction of an expanded conception of health. Thus, this project has the objective of investigating the senses these agents from FHP units located in the city of Altinópolis, São Paulo, Brazil, construct about social networks and how they can influence in their practice. In Altinópolis there are five units of FHP, with six teams of five CHA. One unit is formed by two teams, totalizing thirty CHA. The data collection consists in two meetings of "discussion groups" with the agents of each unit. In the first meeting, the aim is to know their comprehension about social network, its functions and relevance in people's lives. In the second one, we intend to analyze the constitution of the social networks of the CHA and to discuss the relations noticed by them between their social networks and health. The analysis will be done through qualitative procedures, based on the social constructionist movement contributions in psychology. The data will be submitted to a thematic-processual analysis, through which we will try to identify the senses present in the discursive practices of the CHA about social network and health - themes -, as well as the production process of these senses in the context of the discussion groups. With this study, we expect to contribute with a greater involvement of Psychology in the field of public health, helping to increase the understanding of health in its psychological and social determinants. (AU)

Academic Publications

(References retrieved automatically from State of São Paulo Research Institutions)

PINHEIRO, Ricardo Lana. The practice of the communitarian health agent with social networks at Family Health Strategy. 2012. Master's Dissertation - Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (PCARP/BC) Ribeirão Preto.