Abstract

PORTELA GARCIA, Sandra Carolina. Diabetes and Hypertension from a Kaingang Perspective: Self-Care Practices, Articulations and Conflicts. Desacatos [online]. 2018, n.58, pp.50-65. ISSN 2448-5144.

Based on an ethnographic approach among Kaingang Indians diagnosed as hypertensive or diabetic, this article describes different practices of self-attention adopted by this indigenous group with the intention of dealing with these diseases, and explores how they integrate for a complex network of relationships established among various medical traditions coexisting in the region. Within these practices, we will know the native perspectives on diabetes and hypertension that arise in this context and differ from the one established by biomedicine and the Brazilian Unified Health System. Likewise, through these practices, we will address the autonomy of indigenous patients and their agency capacity to respond biopower practices established by the State through biomedical practice.

Keywords : self-attention practices; Kaingang; hypertension; diabetes; biopower.