EDITORIAL
The current issue of Texto & Contexto Nursing Journal deals with the theme, "Culture in Nursing and Health". It approaches culture as having different denotations, reflecting in this way theoretical and operational diversity, whether through academic disciplines or through health professionals who make use of this concept. Thus, from an editorial point of view, the Journal expresses as well the commitment which we continue to make with the plurality of knowledge and practices related to the themes it outlines. As such, the Journal brings to its readers all the idealogies and styles of thought which can promote healthy debate around the numerous thematic issues which are published.
In its various sections, the theme on the agenda is investigated in multiple and complementary ways. In its entirety, fascicle is a vehicle for ideas and manners of contributing towards a sample of the state of the art of "culture" in scientific production from health care professionals, and especially from nurses.
The Research section begins with one such contribution, directing one's gaze inside health care institutions. Its intention is to catch a glimpse if nursing workers, who are also users of a determined university hospital, emphasize more a "culture of subalternatives" or a "culture of solidarity". The results, anchored in their reference to institutional analysis, show distinct values, beliefs, and concepts imbricated in such cultures, which reveals the distinct forces that both possess in the conception of what it is to receive and offer care in a hospital. The next investigation focuses upon culture as a symbolic system for identifying the representations what nursing workers in a maternity ward possess concerning the very term "culture", as they develop the care process in families in a unit of multiple-patient rooms. It deals with a portion of ethnography which brings the discussion of the hospital as a clinical reality and as a complete institution to the forefront, as well as incites us to reflect about the significance of developing culturally sensitive and culturally competent care. In the next article is found a study of the social constructions of the masculine and the feminine, taken from the vision of care-givers for pre-school children. The results point to "different care for different subjects", and lead one to consider the perspective of the cultural construction of gender notions. The text published next deals with the research report of a study which looks for the attributed meanings for blood donors and blood receptors, viewing a symbolic dimension for such representation.
Following the Research section, an original article is presented which seeks to comprehend a cultural disease which affects newborns, under the perspective of mothers of newborns who died as a result of such pathology. Then, a report is presented on a concluded investigation whose objective dealt with the professional identity of the nurse, based on three periods: the period prior to university; the period during university; and the period which follows graduation from university. The next text approaches some facets of the therapeutic itinerary of popular groups, after orientations made by health care professionals, showing that the family and popular system of family care has worth and that it is a reference in the conduct concerning facing the processes of sickness and health. Another article focuses on an ethnographic study completed in Venezuela, which outlines cultural care adopted by diabetic pregnant women in the process of caring for themselves. Its results refer to the need to consider the three modes of care proposed by Madeleine Leininger in terms of congruent cultural care. Another contribution to this edition is an article which deals with the importance of visual ethnographic outlines to assist in the comprehension of the sickness-health process of users and for the evaluation of health care services. There is yet another original article involving an investigation about social, cultural, and historical determinants of popular practices within the community, whose results confirm the diversity of therapeutic conduct and diagnostic means used by Brazilian social groups. Next, there is a qualitative study, of interactionist foundation, which sought to unveil the significance of maternal breast-feeding for grandparents and children, as well as propose cultural negotiation strategies for these children and grandparent, together with health care professionals who work in this area. The remaining studies outline, the cultural impact of the implementation of the humanization program to the delivery and birth in a determined Brazilian scene, as well as the instrumental subsidies for the utilization of fixed therapies within the public network of health care.
The Reflection section includes an important theoretical contribution from a Canadian author with respect to the intercultural dialogue within Nursing, particularly in order to think about the perspective of programs for culturally sensitive or culturally competent care. Another inclusion within this section deals with a theoretical rehearsal which incites reflections around the theme of death, sickness, and organ transplants, approaching it under a prism of social practices, as much significant practices, and yet, cultural practices. Another article for reflection weaves its way around the representations of breast-feeding and the impacts they have or could have during the educational practices developed by health care professionals who work with sexuality and reproductive rights. Finally, the section contemplates a theoretical contribution about cultural questions that involve violence in infancy.
This publication also contains, in its section of Experience Report, two relevant texts. While the first highlights a descriptive and analytical perspective about the development of anthropology of care in a Spanish academic environment, the other presents a reflexive dialogue around the questions of delivery, considering their cultural foundations, or rather, imbued with symbols and significance, particularly in what refers to today's day and age and the performance of the woman who lives in it. Wrapping up this edition, we present a sketch of the work that outlines the cultural identity of post-modernism, translating it as yet another relevant text that contributes to the reflections concerning culture and its influences in the field of health care and nursing.
In summary, the current edition, upon incorporating the various contributions which are constructed around the theme "culture", shows how knowledge from thus emerged can aid in assistential ccare, investigative care, and educational care in health and nursing. Certainly, you readers will find other benefits as a result of this publication, upon discussing the role of culture as performed in daily life.
Marisa Monticelli, PhD
Editor
Publication Dates
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Publication in this collection
03 Apr 2008 -
Date of issue
Mar 2006
