Domestic Violence and Ethical-Political Support: Informal Care Networks of Users of the Psychosocial Care Center and the Social Care Referral Center in the Brazilian Context

This study aimed to identify and discuss the informal
care networks of women in situations of domestic violence who are users of mental health and social assistance specialized care services in a city of the interior of Northeast Brazil. The theoretical and methodological perspectives adopted were the institutional analysis with an emphasis on intervention-research, which allowed to visualize the forces that tend to the reproduction (instituted) and those that tend to transform a certain phenomenon (instituting). To this end, six meetings were carried out with the professionals of the domestic violence services, plus interviews with four women from the meetings. Also, other instruments used in this study
were the research diary, ecomaps, and medical  records of the services. Thus, the data analysis flowed to identify three analyzers about what has remained and what has been transformed in the informal networks of care for women in situations of domestic violence. The first analyzer refers to the women’s informal network configuration based on domestic violence. The second consists in the relationship between the formal and informal network, and the third consists in the warm and living networks possibly built with the contribution of the research process. It is also worth noting the important role of the informal network as a care sevice for women in situations of domestic violence and ethical-political suffering, as it appears as a network capable of contributing to the participation and autonomy of users within healthcare.