Work process of the Family Health Strategy during the pandemic in Recife, Brazil: socio-spatial singularities

Abstract

The multiple impacts of COVID-19 on the territories where the teams of the Family Health Strategy are linked require reorganizing the work process. In this study, it is proposed to analyze the recommendations of the Health Department of the city of Recife (Pernambuco) aimed at changes in the work process of the Strategy during the COVID-19 pandemic, relating them to the socio-spatial singularities of the territories where the teams are linked. This is a case study developed through documentary research with 14 documents. The results indicate that the components of the work process (object, instruments, actions and purposes) are centered on the disease, presupposing work with an individual and clinical approach. The collective actions of promotion and surveillance are directed almost exclusively at the community health agent. In general, the recommendations do not consider the magnitude of the health needs arising from the repercussions of COVID-19 and incipiently contemplate the socio-spatial singularities of the territories. However, the results obtained only portray the perspective of the recommendations, highlighting the need to check the operationalization, in the search to understand the directionality and width of the reorganized work process due to the COVID-19 pandemic and its relationship with the socio-spatial singularities.

Keywords:
COVID-19; Primary Health Care; Family Health Strategy; work process; sociocultural territory