OBJECTIVE:
To identify the practices elderly people from different ethnic groups adopt for health care and in disease situations.
METHODS:
Symbolic Interactionism and Grounded Theory were used as the theoretical-methodological strategy. Data were collected from February to July 2011, involving 33 elderly people from different ethnic groups, at their homes.
RESULTS:
Health care involves physical exercise, food, prayer and work, and only the French showed concerns with this aspect across the lifetime. In illness situations, faith and religiosity guide care among the Lebanese; the use of teas among the Paraguayans; traditional medicine associated with the use of teas among the French, the Chinese and the Brazilian.
CONCLUSION:
Geriatric nursing needs knowledge about the different care practices, because they approximate professionals to the elderly and their family, allowing them to plan and implement actions appropriate to each specific situation.
Aging; Culture; Ethnic Groups; Nursing