Access the Unified Health System actions and services from the perspective of judicialization

• Main Authors: Raquel de Souza Ramos, Antonio Marcos Tosoli Gomes, Denize Cristina de Oliveira, Sergio Corrêa Marques, Thelma Spindola, Virginia Paiva Figueiredo Nogueira
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universidade de São Paulo
• Series: Revista Latino-Americana de Enfermagem
• Subjects: Sistema Único de Salud; Política de Salud; Derecho a la Salud; Decisiones Judiciales; Percepción Social; Enfermería
• Online Access: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0104-11692016000100320&lng=en&tlng=en

Objective: the judicialization of health is incorporated into the daily work of health institutions in Brazil through the court orders for access. In this study, the objective was to describe the contents of the social representations of access, through judicialization, for the health professionals. Method: qualitative study based on Social Representations Theory, involving 40 professionals, at a teaching hospital and at the center for the regulation of beds and procedures in Rio de Janeiro. Forty semistructured interviews were held, to which the thematic-categorical content analysis technique was applied. Results: the health professionals' attitude towards the reality the judicialization imposes is negative, but they acknowledge this resource as necessary in view of the public health crisis. Judicialization is considered a strategy to exercise citizenship that superimposes individual on collective law, increases social inequalities in access and compromises the efficacy of health policies. Conclusion: considering social representation as a determinant of practices, the representations that emerged can contribute to the change of the professionals' practices. Improvements in user care should be promoted, characterized as one of the main challenges to advance in universal access to health.