Despite the evolution and the improvement in the quality of the assistance given to the people with leprosy (hanseniasis), in Brazil, the presence of the stigma of the illness is still observed. The present research is a descriptive study aiming at characterizing the profile of the patients with Hansen's disease in city of the state of São Paulo (Brazil) and identifying the psychosocial repercussions associated to the illness. After the approval of the Ethics Committee, the interviews had been recorded, transcribed and its content had been analysed. The results had been: 50% were women; 71% had low level of education (incomplete elementary school) and the rest was composed by illiterates (43% of women and 14.3% of men), 65% of them were more than 45 years old. The multibacillary group predominated (93%) and the percentage of people who abandoned the treatment at least once was 43%. They had related some aspects: discrimination at work; disability retirement; friends distance, prejudice because of the disease, and daily habits change. We can conclude that these people studied by this research are excluded socially, have the stigma at work, at their leisure and in their interpersonal relationships. By this way, the study points out the need of health care actions able to promote their social insertion.