[Breast self examination: meanings for patients in chemotherapeutic treatment]

To verify the practice and to identify the meaning of the breast self examination among women with cancer and were submitted to the chemotherapy were objectives of this work. It was a qualitative research, using the speech of the women who are breast cancer carriers in the Hospital das Clínicas of the Universidade Federal do Triângulo Mineiro, Uberaba, MG, Brazil through semi-structured interviews. The collected material was submitted to the analysis of the simplified content proposed by Thiollent. The interviewees owned knowledge on the existence and Importance of breast self examination, however, many did not practice it correctly or ignored the periodicity and technic indicated, there being, this way, need to develop effective interventions to promote the understanding of the feminine population concerning the importance in adopting practices aimed at the precocious diagnosis of the mammary cancer.