Social representations about health and strategies women of fisherman from the municipal district of Porto Rico, Paraná state use to face illnesses

Abstract

The objective of this work is to understand the social representations about health and the strategies used to face illnesses among the women of the fishermen of Porto Rico. We used as theoretical referential the Theory of Social Representations. In September, 2000 we accomplished 30 interviews which were recorded, transcribed and submitted to the thematic analysis. The analysis revealed that health is understood in a multidimensional way, including the physic, psychic, spiritual, social and ecological dimensions. To face diseases, the participants go through parallel services, the popular and official medicine, depending on the severity of the disease and on which family member is ill. The popular medicine is applied more often in children. For adults, the official medicine is preferentially used, but only when the problems of health begin to interfere with the work. The knowledge of the interrelated factors involved in the process health-disease and also of the strategies used to face the illnesses, may explain the little success of some health politics in certain cases and circumstances. Thus, any treatment action, of prevention or of planning should take into account the values, attitudes and beliefs of the groups to whom the action is destined.