THE MENTAL HEALTH INTERNSHIP’S CONTRIBUTION ON THE SOCIAL WORKER’S FORMATION PROCESS: AN EXPERIENCE NARRATIVE

Abstract

This article analyzes two fields of supervised curricular internship in the area of Mental Health in the undergraduate course in Social Work at the Federal University of São Paulo (UNIFESP) and seeks to understand the contributions that such experience makes possible for the social worker's professional training process, it also reflects about the limits and possibilities of professional performance in mental health services. The internships were carried out in two Psychosocial Care Centers (CAPS) in the Baixada Santista Metropolitan Region between June/2022 and December/2023. The complexity of mental health work was highlighted, where it presents itself as an expression of the complex social issue in the capitalist system, in addition to the
issues that permeate mental health policy, such as the lack of funding that affects the structures and intervention of CAPS and the extensive limits and existing possibilities that permeate the implementation of mental health policy.