The objective of this reflection was to understand epidemiology as the theoretical-methodological framework for collective health nursing practice. This study is a bibliographic investigation which analyzed articles and books that point out the strengths and weaknesses of classic, social and critical epidemiology, with the purpose to examine their concepts in regards to nursing practice. The connections between the knowledge obtained from the abovementioned views of epidemiology which allow the creation of nursing interventions to change health realities are discussed. Critical epidemiology is supported by the recognition of the protecting processes and wearing determinants of the health-disease process experienced by different social classes. Hence, nurses should plan health interventions aiming beyond the identified illness, proposing interventions committed to changing historical and social processes, taking into account the unique, particular or structural dimensions that eventually determine the health-disease process in individuals or groups.
Epidemiology; Public health; Health-disease process; Nursing care