“Será que o que faço é psicoterapia?”: o atendimento psicológico em domicílio sob a perspectiva Fenomenológico-Existencial

Abstract

Psychology as a science and career is expanding in Brazil, acquiring new outlines and specificities as it follows the transformations and historical events in the political, social, economic, and technological areas of the country. Psychological care at home is a modality of activity that is expanding in Brazil. The professional is requested to encounter the one who has difficulty getting to the psychological office due to a pathology, an emotional malaise, or opts for the comfort of home. Concomitantly, the significant growth in the number of older adults in the Brazilian population over the last decade is noticeable, due to the advances of medicine and its vast resources to extend the time and quality of life of the population. This consolidated the Home Care service both in the public sphere (primary care) as in private (home care). Thus, the present study aims to ask about the possibility of a phenomenological-existential clinical practice that occurs at home but does not rely on a technocratic activity. Therefore, we began the investigative trajectory by showing clinical situations that evidenced how the specificities of the traditional psychological clinic were configured amid the peculiarities of the home environment and how the author dealt with the elements in question, based on the existential phenomenology. We then elaborated a narrative review of the qualitative research literature on experience reports of home-based psychologists. We used the phenomenological suspension while reading the publications to point out the authors' perception regarding the configuration of confidentiality, privacy, contact with family and caregivers in this area, as well as the difficulties and challenges pointed out by psychologists, and we conclude that the studies are based on a technocratic perspective. Thereby, we proposed to make a comparative analysis between the traditional psychotherapeutic practice and the phenomenological-existential one so that we can finally answer the question: what I do is psychotherapy? For this, we approach the etymological meaning of the word psychotherapy, which refers to a way of caring for the soul. We close the topic by highlighting the psychotherapist's way of being to emphasize that the psychotherapist is not limited to the fulfillment of a function, but can be an attitude, a way of being. Finally, we conclude that for a long time, clinical psychology has no longer been reduced to a particular and minimally stable environment, because clinical psychology and clinical listening take place anywhere, in any area of professional practice. Moreover, we defend that it is possible to deal with the elements of psychotherapy without assuming a tutelary posture.