This is a qualitative, exploratory-interpretative study, with the purpose of investigating the social representations of health surveillance among members of the National Health Surveillance Agency - ANVISA, in Rio Grande do Sul State. It was found that health surveillance is represented by subjects as a process that, despite the contradictions, is being constructed and lived in the job routine with signs of renovation of existing representations. Thus, health protection acquires a new understanding, deviating from the prevention limits that traditionally focus on disease in order to return to promotion itself. Also, the image of health police is displaced from punishment to health education, establishing links between normative and educative performance. Moreover, professionalism is based on responsibility and knowledge, and professional devaluation is anchored in the idea of exclusion. The results allow for an analysis of the elements that can be causing permanencies and influencing the movements of daily practice, being able to revert into a benefit for the construction of a professional profile.
health surveillance; international health regulation; health manpower; public policies in health