Abstract

The role of psychologists in a system that advocates the social rights of the population requires these professionals to understand political, social and economic factors that determine the living conditions of families and individuals assisted by the SUAS and are directly related to the situations that produce the violations of these rights. The present study aimed to characterize the work of psychologists in the Creas of Santa Catarina and to describe the perceptions of the role of psychologists in these facilities. Exploratory-descriptive research made use of mixed methods. Quantitative data was retrieved from the CadSUAS, whereas qualitative data came from semi-structured interviews with 18 professionals from six Creas. Descriptive statistics was used for the analysis of the former and content analysis was used to work with the latter. We identified 464 registered psychologists in 83 municipalities that have Creas in Santa Catarina. Almost half of the professionals have active record in Creas and other Social Work bodies at the same time. Most psychologists are employed as statutory servants, but 17% of them have precarious employment contracts. The role of psychologists is heading toward psychosocial care, i.e., migrating from a traditional clinical model inherited from the Sentinel Program to more integrated activities in multidisciplinary teams and cross-sector actions, with focus on community-based social work. There are challenges related to training these professionals and to fighting precarious working conditions in psychological services of social protection.

Unique System of Social Assistance; Specialized Reference Center for Social Assistance; Professional Role; Psychologist; Psychosocial Support Systems