The National Curricular Directives for undergraduates in the health area were approved in 2002, in an attempt to break the biomedical paradigm with regards to the production of knowledge and professions. With the purpose of adapting to those directives, the Physiotherapy course at the State University of Londrina reformulated its curriculum and, included among the alterations, it expanded the class hours and restructured the Collective Health discipline. The purpose of this study was to analyze whether the Collective Health content of the new curriculum covers the formation of abilities under the curricular directives, as well as evaluating student perceptions with regards to their formation for working with basic health care. Accordingly, a documentary analysis of the content of interviews given by graduating students in the last semester of their courses was carried out. It was ascertained that the content analyzed covers essential aspects of social sciences and humanities in health, and that the apprenticeship in basic health care was what most provided experience in team work. Despite assessing the Collective Health classes positively, the students suggested that the theoretical discussions be more articulated to the apprenticeship, because, accordingly, there would be greater opportunities for learning the work of physiotherapy in the basic health care arena more effectively.
physiotherapy; curriculum; basic health care; higher education
