[Suffering and pleasure experienced by nurses working at an intensive care unit of a university hospital]

The purpose of this study is to grasp and to understand the nurses' social representations concerning their work in intensive care unit and the ways of expressing feelings of suffering and pleasure. Six nurses of the intensive care unit of medical, surgical and pediatric clinics were interviewed. The analysis of the social representations made possible the apprehension of the symbolic dimension of the work in the psycho-social (individual), social-dynamic (group) and institutional perspective. We verified that the work in intensive care unit brings pleasure to nurses despite of intense emotional constraint. This qualitative study allowed na in-depth reflection on the issue and made evident the need to deepen research. However, other investigations have to be carried out to deepen the subject on the subjective and symbolic dimension to subsidize the administration of human resources in nursing.