The machitún is the healing ceremony. The machi, who nowadays is almost always a female, presides the ritual. In dreams, she receives the ancestral knowledge and the power to influence the nature of sicknesses and other natural phenomena.
The traveler E.R. Smith (middle of the XIXth century) describes the rite as follows: "When one resorts to a machi the visit takes place at dawn, because this is the most precise time for her managements... The patient must lie on his back in the middle of the ruka, all family members are asked to leave or, otherwise, they must facing the wall. After checking the symptoms, the machi begins a long magic ceremony consisting in a monotonous chant along with the playing of a small drum, made by a sheepskin stretched over a wooden frame. She becomes excited, making gestures and violent contortions, until falling on her back as in an epileptic fit, with her eyes turned up and foam coming out of her mouth and her body twisted in convulsions.