Art Therapy. A complementary tool for health care in the metropolitan area of Buenos Aires

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze the use of art as a therapeutic offer, in order to prevent, cure or alleviate physical discomfort, emotional and social problems in a context of multiple medicines. In the process of health care in the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires, stakeholders make use of various therapies that are available. To address the ailments that afflict, they select and combine biomedical care, home remedies, religious and alternative therapies, including therapeutic tools that provide artistic languages, such as music, dance therapy, art therapy, including other options that are continually recreated. These interventions impact positively on the patient’s health, specially in physical, emotional and social areas, as explored through the field work. Methodologically, we intend to develop an ethnography to account the experiences and meanings that explain the processes associated with the combination of medicines in the city of Buenos Aires. The theoretical framework of this paper is the hermeneutic phenomenological methods, which allows us to access the experience of the subject, which are the core of the analysis, using material from open interviews and observation to the informants.