Words used by Brazilian nurses in their practice in collective health were identified in the project CIPESC developed in Brazil. The project represented the Brazilian contribution to the international project of ICN and it was developed by managers and 115 researchers in the health basic units of 15 research sites selected ali over the country. It was applied 10 research tools and 49 focal groups were performed with the participation of 720 individuais of the nursing staff. The information contained in the focal groups were transcribed and it was submitted to processual and semantic analysis in order to characterize the work process and to contribute for a standardized language used by the nursing staff in collective health field. The results showed what the nurses do and the reasons for their nursing actions.
collective health; classification; nursing