Curricular Integration from Analysis of a Discipline in a Medical Course

ABSTRACT The analysis of curricular practices has been an increasingly present activity in scientific production in the field of curriculum, mainly because in them the relations established between the knowledge, the prescribed curriculum and its accomplishment in the educational routine are aligned. In the field of medical education this analysis acquires special value, given the incipient production of works that evaluate pedagogical practices from a curricular point of view. Thus, we present the critical analysis of a curricular practice carried out in a discipline of a Medicine school, which is pertinent for presenting new looks about practice as a living expression of the curriculum in action. From the thematic content analysis about a theoretical-practical discipline we show elements that approach the integrative curricular paradigm, according to the theoretical references of Gimeno Sacristán, James Beane and Luíza Alonso. Indicators like contextualization of practice, integration of curricular areas and teacher integration are some of the elements that make up an integrated conception of curriculum, whose interdisciplinary in coherence with the central axis of curriculum development (health necessities of persons and populations identified by the health system) are pointed out in the Curricular Guidelines National for Medicine Courses as a possibility to develop meaningful and contextualized learning, focusing on the student as a subject of learning. These recommendations are of fundamental importance in the area of health, when the articulation of what one learns with the scenarios and the professional practices base (or at least must substantiate) the formation. The analysis made it possible to understand how health education can benefit from an integrated curricular organization that offers diversification and dialogue between different knowledge, relevant in the investigation and resolution of problems in the health-disease process, as well as the construction of theoretical-practical knowledge pertinent to a humanistic, critical and reflexive formation.