Hospital morbidity of children under five years old in a brazilian border municipality

Abstract

Objective: to describe the causes of hospitalization of children under five years old and the factors associated with avoidable hospitalizations in a Brazilian municipality of the triple border. Method: a cross-sectional study of hospital morbidity, with data collection in medical records, conducted at the public hospital of reference for pediatric care in a municipality of the triple border between Brazil, Paraguai and Argentina, from May 2017 to April 2018. The hospitalizations were classified as avoidable and non-avoidable. The independent variables were as follows: medical diagnosis; gender; age; hospitalization period; outcome and country of residence. The ratios of non-adjusted prevalence and adjusted by the log-binomial regression model were estimated to verify the association between the dependent variable, avoidable hospitalizations, and the independent variables. Results: there were 758 hospitalizations, 45.1% of which were considered avoidable. The main causes of hospitalization were diseases of the respiratory system (42.8%), the group of undefined causes (13.8%) and infectious and parasitic diseases (10%). The avoidable hospitalizations were associated with the age group of less than one year old, with longer hospitalization time and with the “discharge to home” outcome. Conclusion: the avoidable hospitalizations were responsible for almost half of the hospitalizations, mostly due to respiratory diseases, being associated with less than one year old, longer hospitalization time and better outcome. These findings suggest the need to strengthen the Primary Health Care actions through adequate financial investment to reduce unnecessary hospitalizations.