This article aimed to identify strategies for dealing with situations of violence against women by primary health care professionals, especially physicians. This is a qualitative research that combines documentary sources, medical records and interviews. This study brought together steps 2 and 3 of a larger survey in which reports of occurrences of gender violence perpetrated by an intimate partner were analyzed. Primary information was obtained through interviews with 16 women and secondary information from 14 medical records of the womens referral health services. The information was analyzed according to Bardins content analysis, revealing two main categories of analysis: professionals reiterated violence as a domestic phenomenon restricted to the private environment; and the medicalization of violence. It was found that when violence against women is not made invisible or neglected, it is medicalized.