A dinâmica da demanda por serviços de saúde no município de Piraí, RJ, do ponto de vista da medicalização

Abstract

Although the definition of the Family Health Strategy (FHS) as the preferred gateway to the health system and strategy for the reorganization of assistance, users of SUS, demonstrate historically their preference for the hospital emergency service. In this context, the field of this study is the city of Piraí e its habitants, that since 2002 have 100% cover of FHS, model of health care that emphasis: the territorial logics of assistance, the continuing and transverse care, the bond (between user and health professionals) and the access facilitated by humanized host and qualified listening; being the center of the net services acting as the order and coordinator of health care. Evaluating the reports of productivity (focusing on doctors treatment) from the city hospital and the FHS units we notice that the search for the hospital medical care has greatly increased in the past years, although the most part of this users have primary care demands , which is considered illogical and contradictory by managers and health professionals. The daily practice has led me to a reflexion process over the users expectations on their search for the health system (mostly the FHS), over the routes users bield before a health issue and how is the decision-making process in pursuit of resolvability of the issue. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to understand how this demand is built; which criterions are evolved in the decision-making process of this users when they choose the hospital service as preferred gateway; even in a city that offers a well structured health service, based on FHS guidelines and with a cover that achieve all habitants. We believe that the process known as medicalisation, that describes a process by which nonmedical problems become defined and treated as medical problems, usually in terms of illness and disorders (CONRAD, 2007); influences the decision-making process of users. Concerning to the methodology, semi-structured interviews were conducted with SUS users, residents in Piraí and that spontaneously searched the hospital emergency service. We verified that user s image of health services is related mostly with the waiting time for care, the access (understood mainly as the certainty/uncertainty to receive the care) and the accessibility. Users frequently refers to the FHS organization with the access barriers (mostly for the need of schedule appointments) and shown to have, related to the FHS image, great limitation of human resources (almost exclusively in relation to physicians) and materials. On the other hand, emergency rooms and hospitals present themselves, for so many reasons, as spaces of guaranteed access. It is important to highlight that the process of medicalisation appears as an important part of the gear that moves the construction of this demand for health services.