Health workers working in Intensive Care Unities experience complex situations where there is suffering due to patients suffering, among other factors. This article aimed to verify the meanings and the satisfaction arising from the work of 80 ICU employees at a public hospital from Santa Catarina and a private one from Rio de Janeiro. For data collection, questionnaires and interviews were used and the analysis was made by descriptive statistics. It is noteworthy that the meanings of working at the ICUs researched varied around the notion of social contribution and responsibility and/or exchange. Social relations at work were shown as a central dimension for most of the individuals. Most of them consider working not as something negative, but as one of the most important item of their lives, surpassing even the idea of the payment that it originates. It was observed that the understanding of the meanings assigned to work is an essential factor to achieve the emotional balance of workers at hospitals and to understand the conditioning causes of possible disruptions of this balance, which is a crucial factor for the promotion of mental health and life quality at work.
Meanings of working; Health workers; Satisfaction; Mental health
