Introduction: Family plays an important role in the patient's environment, the complexity in the intensive care unit services generates situational and emotional crisis in the immediate family which causes anxiety and stress. Objective: To evaluate the perception of the relatives of critical patients about the verbal and nonverbal communication, and the emotional support provided by nursing staff during hospitalization in the intensive care unit which belong to a IV social level clinic in Cucuta city. Materials and Methods: A quantitative and descriptive cross sectional study was conducted. The sample consisted of 200 relatives; for data collection was used as instrument. (Perception of the Relatives of Critical Patients), according to the nursing work during the situational crisis. Results: The perception of the family is favorable by 80% expressing a positive connotation. Discussion: Relatives of patients consider the work of nursing as humanized behavior care focused on the valuation of the human being as a holistic being, where the care given was characterized by behaviors such as empathy, effective communication, affection and touch. Conclusions: To humanize the intensive care unit allows recognizing the family as a central axis for all assistance actions; a collaborative family is a healthy family, which has more tools to fight against despair that generates the income of patients to the critical hospitalization service.