[Between chemotherapies, herbalism and spiritualities: Anthropological study of therapeutic pluralism in adults with cancer in Mexico].

Objectives: To analyze the characteristics of therapeutic pluralism in adult patients at a hospital Cancer Center, based on their health/illness/care-neglect trajectories.

Methods: Analytical-explanatory, ethnographic, transversal-applied qualitative study. Data was provided by ten participants with cancer treated at the Veracruz State Cancer Center. Ethnographic records, participant observation and semi-structured interviews were carried out using observational guides, semi-structured interview guides and hospital clinical records. Participants were identified with pseudonyms for privacy and confidentiality.

Results: Two main results were: 1) characterization of the diversity of therapies utilized by participants throughout their biographical trajectory related to their health/disease/care-neglect processes; 2) identification of the cultural characteristics involved in these complex processes of therapeutic plurality, closely related to the appearance of cancer.

Conclusion: Sociocultural aspects are interwoven with emerging therapeutic pluralities in the complex disease processes in cancer. The implications of these factors in the health/disease/care-neglect processes in cancer are manifest even before the first symptoms, in daily actions of self-care and preventive care. The mixing of therapies is an effect of the globalization characteristic of capitalist societies, in which therapeutic pluralism becomes an optimal phenomenon for commercialization and consumption.