Health care practices with Quilombola children: caregivers’ perception

Abstract

Abstract Objective to analyze, in caregivers’ perception, the health care practices provided to Quilombola children. Method an exploratory-descriptive, qualitative study carried out in the Quilombola community Santa Rita de Barreira, São Miguel do Guamá, Pará, Brazil. Data were produced between July and September 2021, with caregivers of children aged zero to five years, through individual interviews guided with a semi-structured instrument. For analysis, Microsoft Office Excel 2019 and the Interface de R pour les Analyses Multidimensionnelles de Textes et de Questionnaires 0.7, alpha 2 were used, through Descending Hierarchical Classification. Results eighteen female caregivers participated, aged between 20 and 67 years. They related care to disease prevention and treatment, life habits, health services access and popular practices that value traditional medicine. Conclusions and implications for practice women’s knowledge and actions expressed influences from their culture, their beliefs and their ways of interpreting and symbolizing reality. Recognizing and questioning Quilombola practices in child care is a challenge that goes beyond the biomedical, reductionist and stigmatizing discourse, a context in which it is necessary to expand the interdisciplinary debate on the subject.