DYNAMICS OF FAMILY OPERATION AND DRUG USE: IMPLICATIONS IN PSYCHOSOCIAL CARE
Families; drugs; public policy; care practices
Hegemonic conceptions about drugs, the social belongings of the families and the guidelines put by the public policies reverberate in the practices of care and in the way of conceiving the problems related to the use of drugs in the familiar context. The present study aims to investigate the relationship between the dynamics of family functioning and the modes of care related to drug use. More specifically, it proposes to map the problems and types of resources that families offer, to discuss the different dynamics familiar in the relation with the use of drugs, and to propose strategies so that they can deal with problems related to the use of drugs by some of their Member States. Therefore, a qualitative study focused on the case of two families with different socioeconomic characteristics was carried out. Individual and group interviews were used to construct the data, observation and recording in field diary from the meetings with each one of them. It was identified that the absence of adequate support in the psychosocial care network, especially in the substitutive services, reduces the potential for autonomy and emancipation in the care practices operated by relatives. This factor is directly related to the dynamics of family functioning that are organized around the support and mutual help among the family members, but that in the face of the lack of options and the helplessness, they become fragile when looking for answers related to excessive medicalization or social isolation. Based on this, we propose strategies of care that distance themselves from reductionist forms, involving families in the construction of unique therapeutic projects that respect the specificities of family contexts and that promote more powerful ways of life in the face of problems due to the use of drugs, especially focusing on the care not only of the person who uses drugs but also of the family group as a whole.