NON-MEDICAL HEALTHCARE: TENSION, OPPOSITION OR INTEGRATION?

Abstract

The disabling of popular healing practices due to disqualification and hostility mechanisns is historically recognized as a phenomenon associated with the strength of the establishment of scientific medicine as the unique reliable discourse / practice for health care. This debate has been revisited due to the presence of current integrative therapies that reinserted many of these practices once denied in experiences of care and healing, such as adherence and acceptance, growing significantly nowadays. This paper argues that these movements and practices are currently widespread and cannot be understood as external phenomena or isolated assemblages, but as progressively recognized healing practices due to  their potentialities. To that end, they are analyzed as "Alternative", "Holistic", "Complementary" and "Integrative", stressing as tensions, oppositions and integrations in this field of coexistence between medical and non-medical practices. As analyzes carried out in this work, the historical-analytical character was carried out from theoretical investigations and literature reviews with secondary sources and reference guides.