This study aimed at analyzing the conformation of the Epidemiological Surveillance Service in Ribeirão Preto Municipal Health Secretariat under the orientation of the principles established by the Unified Health System and the perspective of Health Surveillance in face of the health care municipalization process occurring in the 1990s through the following dimensions: territory; problems; intersectoriality based on positive health concepts and on the paradigm of social health production. By means of a qualitative approach, bibliographical and documentation sources as well as 17 semi-structured interviews were used. Data were analyzed through the thematic analysis technique by which the following themes were identified: from "Monitoring" to "Educating and Preventing": practice in Epidemiological Surveillance -- a proposal to work in the territory. It was concluded that the potentiality of actions related to Epidemiological Surveillance is associated with the perspective of working in the territory for the construction of Health Surveillance in order to assure the technical content of those actions as well as the participation of different professional categories in the same work project, which will not necessarily be performed by all professionals in the same health production process, territory or time.
public health nursing; epidemiological surveillance; public health surveillance