La Construcción del cuidado en personas con presión arterial alta: miradas desde la teoría del actor-red

Abstract

Introduction: the article describes how care is built for people with high blood pressure (HBP) by tracking human and non-human actants, practices and networks. The study moves away from the investigation of biomedical categories to propose the displacement of the habitual spaces of production of care, identifying where it is endowed with other modes of existence and subjectivation. Objective: to reveal how care is built from the tracking of practices, actants and networks in people with HBP attending a first level hospital in Popayán Colombia in 2021. Methodology: qualitative, ethnographic and praxiographic study, took as information stories from of in-depth interviews, field diary and participant observation in 12 people with HBP and five nurses. The actor-network theory was assumed to trace the construction (enactment) of care. Results: care for people with HBP was constructed in five fields of information: individual, family, community, health care providers, and the health system, involving, in addition to biomedical practices, practices and actors of the sociocultural, political, and economic scenario: religion, herbal medicine, health policies, information systems, administrative transactions, measurement instruments, communication technologies, monitoring, habits, social participation, family dynamics, friends, among others; assembled in different networks. Conclusions: Closely tracked, care turns out to be different things at different times and places; it is built by and through practices, human and non-human actants, and networks that, through networks of relationships, allow the emergence of particular versions of this entity, making it multiple.