Representaciones sociales de la salud en personas sordas y personas ciegas

The present article addresses the social representations of health of20 blind people and 18 people who were deaf from birth and areusers of Colombia sign language, through the hierarchical evocationtechnique and interviews. The research was justified by the lack ofknowledge of these people’s beliefs and opinions about health, whichaffects the processes of social inclusion and their quality of life. Itconsisted on qualitative research with a phenomenological approachthat identified the central components of social representations, whichcorresponded to the biomedical perspective and the conditions for health.As for the peripheral components, health services and access barriers arerepresented, in addition to some representations of rights and agency asan action to obtain care with a differential approach. The meanings of therepresentations focused on the deficiencies of health services, the lack oftraining of professionals, and physical accessibility barriers.