Brazilian Nursing Communication Symposium
SIBRACEN

Abstract

CAVALCANTI, Pacífica Pinheiro, FERNANDES, Ana Fátima Carvalho and RODRIGUES, Maria Socorro Pereira. Communication in the self-help group as a support in the rehablitation of mastectomized women. In Proceedings of the 8. Brazilian Nursing Communication Symposium, 2002, San Pablo (SP, Brazil) [online]. 2002 [cited 25 April 2024]. Available from: <http://www.proceedings.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=MSC0000000052002000100001&lng=en&nrm=iso> .

The study aimed to stimulate communication among mastectomized women that frequent a self-help group, to promote the elevation of self-esteem by improving quality of life and personal harmonization; to unchain group situations that provide the exchange of experiences and "opening up". The participants in the study were women that are part of the GEPAM (Group for Teaching, Research, Self-help and Attendance to the Mastectomized woman). 10 women were interviewed in the months from December 2000 to February 2001. The statements were organized according to the content analysis and grouped in categories as proposed by Rodrigues and Leopardi (1999). Group communication was defined according to themes: sharing feelings and needs, solution mechanisms for the difficulties mentioned by the women; an educational space educational for facing the problem "appropriately"; an interactive space that allowed for making friends and exchanging experiences. It can be noticed that communication is a strong mechanism used by the mastectomized women to reinforce and elevate their own self-esteem, improve quality of life and obtain an interior harmonization.

Keywords : communication; rehabilitation; mastectomized women.