This study addressed the integrative and complementary practices developed at a reference service in the metropolitan region of Belo Horizonte/MG, Brazil. It analyzed how the practices developed in this service were organized and focused on their relationship with health promotion and how they fitted into the Brazilian National Health System (SUS). The results indicated that these practices could be useful resources for health promotion, especially because they establish new understanding of the health-illness process, in a more holistic and empowering manner. However, to boost them within the fields of health promotion and SUS care, challenges relating to organizing and expanding the services need to be surmounted and professionals within the reference services and specialized support for integrative and complementary practices within primary healthcare need to be brought closer together, so as to construct a common field of care.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.