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Public health emergency: social representations among managers of a university hospital 1 1 Paper extracted from doctoral dissertation “Representações sociais de emergência de saúde pública entre gestores em um Hospital Universitário”, presented to Escola de Enfermagem, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil.

AIM:

to comprehend the social representations of public health emergencies among managers who experienced the Influenza A (H1N1) Pandemic of 2009.

METHOD:

a qualitative case study, with its theoretical and methodological framework based on the Theory of Social Representations. The data was obtained through the techniques of free association and semi-structured interviews, applied individually to managers who worked in different positions of the hierarchical management structure of the institution during the pandemic emergency, a total of 30 participants.

RESULTS:

thematic content analysis resulted in the following categories: vulnerability, health protection, neglect - gray areas of the public sphere, and integrality. The social representations of public health emergencies attest to continuities that transit the overvalorization of negative discourses linked to the health/education public space, naturalization of the substantial character of the epidemic, and normative managerial action. However, the defense of ongoing education as a necessity associated with emergency management revealed possibilities for change in the technical-scientific perception of the management.

CONCLUSIONS:

to understand healthcare/nursing workers as political beings, assuming responsibilities in the areas of the macro and micro policies of the State, the university hospitals and the work teams, is a pathway that is emerging for the management of emergencies.

Nursing; Health Management; Surge Capacity; Communicable Diseases; Influenza A Virus


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