Hospitalizations due to primary care-sensitive conditions among children under five years of age: cross-sectional study.

Erika Morganna Neves De Araujo,Gabriela Maria Cavalcanti Costa,Dixis Figueroa Pedraza

doi:10.1590/1516-3180.2016.0344250217

Erika Morganna Neves De Araujo, Gabriela Maria Cavalcanti Costa + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1590/1516-3180.2016.0344250217

Copy DOI

Abstract

Hospitalizations due to primary care-sensitive conditions constitute an important indicator for monitoring the quality of primary healthcare. This study aimed to describe hospitalizations due to primary care-sensitive conditions found among children under five years of age (according to their age and sex), in two cities in Paraíba, Brazil. Cross-sectional study carried out in the municipalities of Cabedelo and Bayeux, in Paraíba, Brazil. Data were collected from four public pediatric hospitals in Paraíba that receive children from these municipalities. Hospital admission authorizations were consulted to gather information on the children's profile and the characteristics of their hospitalizations. Differences in the causes of admissions and the respective lengths of hospital stay length were analyzed according to age group and sex. The proportion of hospital admissions due to primary care-sensitive conditions was 82.4%. The most frequent causes were: bacterial pneumonia (59.38%), infectious gastroenteritis and its complications (23.59%) and kidney and urinary tract infection (9.67%). Boys had higher frequency of hospitalizations due to primary care-sensitive conditions than girls. The median hospitalization due to primary care-sensitive conditions was found to be four days. The duration of hospital stays due to primary care-sensitive conditions was significantly longer than those due to conditions that were not sensitive to primary care. High rates of hospital admissions due to primary care-sensitive conditions were highlighted, especially among children of male sex, with long periods of hospitalization.

Highlights

The indicator “hospitalizations due to primary care-sensitive conditions” was initially proposed in the United States in the 1990s to describe health conditions in which effective primary care provided at the right time can help to reduce or eliminate the need for hospital admissions, because prevention and proper treatment can be applied at early stages of the disease.[1,2]
Among the 627 children under five years of age living in the municipalities of Bayeux and Cabedelo who were admitted to pediatric hospitals in the state of Paraíba in the year 2013, 55.2% were male and 52.6% were aged 25 months or over
The present study showed that a high proportion of admissions were due to ambulatory care-sensitive conditions

Summary

Introduction

Despite the importance of hospital admissions due to ambulatory care-sensitive conditions, studies targeting children under five years of age in Brazil are few and concentrated in the southeastern region of this country.[2] This indicator has great potential for evaluating the quality of primary healthcare for acute conditions that is provided for this age group. Such conditions lead to an associated high probability of hospital admission among these users.[3,5] Children present greater vulnerability to social determinants of health and to worsening of diseases than adults, making their healthcare a priority.[6]

Methods

Results

Conclusion