The identity of the Public Health professional in Brazil: perceptions of Public and Collective Health students and graduates of undergraduate courses

The emergence of Collective Health undergraduate courses in Brazil has called into question the degree of diversity in processes that give legitimacy to professional practice and push for recognition of the identity of the "new" Public Health professional. The objective of this study was to analyze the identity of Public Health professionals based on their formation in Public and Collective Health undergraduate courses in Brazil. This is an exploratory, qualitative study, carried out by means of focus group. Dubar's subjective trajectories, logics of mobility and identity forms was used as a theoretical framework. Although most participants have no previous interest in working with Collective Health, their affinities are revealed by the way in which they define themselves, an element that supports the social construction of professional identities. Subjects and identities become part of the discursive output of many utterances, characterized by a vision of the political and social dimensions and the values that are inherent to medical practice in that field.