MEANINGS AND POSSIBILITIES OF THE PERSON-CENTERED APPROACH AS A PERSPECTIVE FOR MEDICAL EDUCATION

Abstract

This paper reflects on the Person-Centered Approach as a perspective for medical education. It discusses the meanings and possibilities of the concepts of actualizing tendency, empathic understanding, unconditional positive regard, and authenticity in learning experiences in an undergraduate medical course. It considers the contradictions amidst which practices and the construction of knowledge in health develop, and the challenges that Psychology faces as a field of knowledge in this context. The methodological approach adopted was the analysis of the learning experiences of four students and one professor in an elective course in a medical program at a public university in the state of Minas Gerais. The analysis undertaken indicates elements that hinder the learning and experience of these concepts, but shows that they have the potential to question and critique the reality of medical training and contribute to transforming it. Practical activities that provide contact with real situations and with the people who experience them are those that most closely approximate medical training to the concepts of the PCA, especially when they encourage observation and expression of feelings.