Preventive Measures For pressure injuries: structure of social representations of nursing teams

To analyze the structure of social representations on the preventive measures to pressure injury of nursing teams.

Qualitative research, based on the structural approach of Social Representations. It was conducted with 103 nursing professionals from a specialized hospital, using the Word Association Test. Data were submitted to prototypical analysis, using two analysis techniques of centrality, similarity and double negation.

The evocations "care" and "decubitus" made up the central core of the representation, which was structured based on the imagery dimension of changing position, from which a hierarchy of preventive measures occurs. The term "care" referred to the normative dimension of representation as a responsibility of nursing, and to the practical dimension, as preventive actions with the use of technologies.

The image, normative and practice dimensions are part of the representation structure and guide compliance with preventive measures.