In Brazil fostered children/adolescents are among the most vulnerable segments of society. A survey in different institutions which provide shelter services to children/adolescents in Minas Gerais State identified those people´s characteristics, as well as the characteristics of the places where they are sent to. We tried both to identify and to classify the main reasons why a child/adolescent is routed to an institution. Those reasons were mapped, revealing different relative concentrations in the several regions of the state. Hypotheses were developed to justify those concentrations.
Shelters; Children and adolescents; Minas Gerais State
