User embracement in Basic Care: ethical implications on the Health Care of the users

This article identifies and analyses the ethical implications originated from the daily activities of user embracement in basic health units and its implications on the Health Care of the users of the Brazilian Unified Health System. It's a qualitative study of exploitative descriptive design which took place in 5 basic health unit from city's health system of an important city in the state of Santa Catarina (Brazil); 26 individuals have been interviewed, among them are managers, health employees and users. Analyzed in the light of the references of the daily bioethics' and protection bioethics' approaches, the embracement in the cases studied revealed contexts filled with ethical conflicts which emerge from routine activities in health care, showing technical and conceptual distancing, as well as structural limitations. The user's statements pointed out outstanding differences between the users desire to feel embraced respectfully and having their needs accomplished and the frustrating experiences they experienced in the basic health units' daily routine, which reveal situations of exclusion and denial on what concerns to the right to health. The results represent a setback in the implementation of this practice in accordance with the principles of universality in the access, integrality in care and the guarantee of the right to health.