The quality of certification of deaths due to external causes in the city of Fortaleza in the State of Ceará, Brazil

Assessment of incompleteness of Mortality Information System records on deaths from external causes in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, 2000-2019

OBJECTIVE

to evaluate the incompleteness of Mortality Information System (Sistema de Informações sobre Mortalidade - SIM) data on deaths from external causes (ECs) in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, 2000-2019.

METHODS

This was an ecological study, using SIM data on all deaths from external causes and, specifically, from transport accident, homicides, suicides and falls; the analysis of the trend of incompleteness was performed by means of Prais-Winsten regression, with a 5% significance level.

RESULTS

A total of 146,882 deaths were evaluated; sex (0.1%), place of death (0.1%) and age (0.4%) showed the lowest incompleteness in 2019; the proportion of incompleteness showed a decreasing trend for the place of death and schooling, an increasing trend for marital status and a stable trend for age and race/skin color, among all types of death evaluated.

CONCLUSION

the variables analyzed reached a high degree of completion; with the exception of marital status and schooling, for which unsatisfactory scores persisted for deaths from ECs, both total and by subgroups.

Analysis of the completeness of self-harm and suicide records in Pernambuco, Brazil, 2014-2016

INTRODUCTION

Suicides and suicide attempts are major public health problems, and coping strategies are hampered by insufficient or inadequate notifications. Data accuracy influences the formulation of public and mental health policies and suicide prevention strategies. The objective of this study was to analyze the completeness of self-harm and suicide records in the state of Pernambuco, Brazil, 2014-2016.

METHODS

This is an evaluative study with a descriptive design. The data were collected from suicide attempt records from the Notifiable Diseases Information System and suicide records from the Mortality Information System. Probabilistic linkage was used to relate these databases, and the degree of completeness of the variables was calculated. Completeness was classified into the following categories: good (≥ 75.1%), regular (50.1%-75.0%), low (25.1%-50.0%), and very low (≤ 25.0%).

RESULTS

In the analyzed period, 1,404 notifications of self-harm were studied, with an overall mean completeness of 86.2%. In addition, 1,050 suicide records were analyzed, with an overall mean completeness of 95.8%. Most variables referring to suicide attempts had good completeness, with the exception of the variables "occupation" and "education." The completeness of all suicide-related variables was rated as good. After linkage, a significant improvement was observed in the degree of completeness of the variable "occupation".

CONCLUSION

The results of this study showed that the completeness of self-harm and suicide variables improved from the first to the last year. The integration of data from different information systems provides an opportunity to improve suicide prevention programs and the quality of available information. Continuous efforts to increase the completeness and reliability of suicide surveillance systems are fundamental to describe the epidemiological profile and, consequently, plan preventive actions, in addition to contributing to the development and reformulation of strategies aimed at reducing morbidity and mortality related to suicidal behavior.

Improvement of the unspecified external causes classification based on the investigation of death in Brazil in 2017

BACKGROUND

Unspecified causes of death are among the traditional indicators of quality of information.

OBJECTIVE

To verify the performance of the 60 cities in the Data for Health Initiative project and to analyze the reclassification of unspecified external causes of death (UEC).

METHODS

Using the 2017 records from the Mortality Information System, the proportion and percent change in UEC were compared after investigation between project cities and other cities, and the percent of reclassification to specific external causes was calculated.

RESULTS

The project cities comprised 52% (n = 11,759) of the total UEC in Brazil, of which 64.5% were reclassified after investigation, whereas the other cities reclassified 31% of UEC. Results were similar for men, youth, blacks, metropolitan cities, the Southeast region, and deaths attested by forensic institutes. In the project cities, pedestrian traffic accidents were external causes with greater reclassification. In men, the UEC was reclassified to homicides (23.8%) and accident of terrestrial transportation (ATT) (11.1%), with motorcyclists (4.4%) and pedestrians (4.3%) being the most prominent. In women, these causes were changed to other accident causes (20.8%), ATT (10.6%) and homicides (7.9%). UEC changed to ATT (18.3%) in the age groups of 0-14 years old and to homicides (32.5%) in the age groups of 15-44 years.

CONCLUSION

The project cities obtained better results after investigation of UEC, enabling analysis of the reclassification to specific causes by sex and age groups.

Change in the profile of causes of death after investigation of hospital deaths in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 2017

INTRODUCTION

Deaths certified with ill-defined causes or garbage codes (GC) compromise the analysis of mortality and its use for planning and evaluation of public health policies. The hospital investigation of these causes is one of the strategies qualifying the profile of mortality in the country.

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the change in the hospital mortality profile after investigation of deaths certified with GC in 2017 in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.

METHODS

A sample of hospital deaths reported with GC in the Mortality Information System (SIM) of Belo Horizonte in 2017 was investigated and subsequently certified by a physician to compare the mortality profile before and after investigation.

RESULTS

After investigating 1,395 deaths out of 3,038 reported with GC, a reduction of 35.5% of these causes was observed. Groups of all ages presented decreases in GC occurrence. A higher proportional increase was observed for deaths due to ischemic heart diseases, Alzheimer's disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke, and external causes of death (accidental falls, homicides and traffic/transport accidents).

CONCLUSION

The investigation on reported hospital deaths is one of the strategies to improve mortality statistics, reducing the occurrence of GC among reported deaths and changing the mortality profile in these facilities. The importance of continuous physician training in cause-of-death certification is emphasized.

Quality of data on causes of death in southern Brazil: the importance of garbage causes

INTRODUCTION

The study objective was to analyze the quality of data on causes of death in southern Brazil.

METHODS

Mortality Information System (SIM - Sistema de Informações sobre Mortalidade) data were used to evaluate the occurrence of Garbage Causes (GC) in death certificates (DCs) of residents of South states and their capitals between 2015 and 2016. The GC of each state were compared to the other states and grouped by severity level (N1 to N4, according to decreasing potential impact on mortality profile). We evaluated the N1 and N2 GC in the 0-74 years, in accordance with local of occurrence and attesting professional.

RESULTS

The occurrence of GC ranged from 29 to 31% among the three states, below the national average (34%). The GC of levels N1 and N2 were similar between states and heterogeneous between capitals. Most deaths were in-hospital, between 55%-64% of N1 and N2 GC occurred in the states and 39%-55% in the capitals. As for home deaths, this number ranged between 25%-31% and 25%-40%, respectively. More than 30% of the attesting professionals (except in Florianópolis) were declared as "others" in the corresponding DC field. Physicians from the Forensic Medical Institute (IML) and Death Verification Service (SVO) attested 15 to 24% of N1 and N2 GC in the states and 33 to 66% in the state capitals.

CONCLUSION

The improvement of mortality data should involve strategies aimed at hospital physicians, in accordance with the volume of deaths and the IML and SVO services in addition to support for the emission of home DC, due to the importance in generating more severe GC.

Tendência e desigualdade na completude da informação sobre raça/cor dos óbitos de idosos no Sistema de Informações sobre Mortalidade no Brasil, entre 2000 e 2015

A qualidade da informação sobre raça/cor é condição necessária para conhecer o impacto da desigualdade na mortalidade. O objetivo deste trabalho é analisar a tendência e a desigualdade na completude da raça/cor dos óbitos de idosos no Sistema de Informações sobre Mortalidade (SIM) entre 2000 e 2015 no Brasil. Analisa-se a completude dessa variável por diferentes abrangências geográficas, a raça/cor mais afetada pela má completude e a associação entre a excelência do preenchimento da raça/cor com a territorialidade e a condição socioeconômica dos municípios. Os dados dos óbitos de idosos provêm do SIM, e as informações de população, dos Censos e estimativas do Ministério da Saúde. Estima-se a variação percentual da proporção da incompletude. A variação percentual de pretos/pardos foi estimada entre 2000 e 2010 para o SIM e Censos. Estima-se regressão logística simples e ajustada (IC95%), tendo, como desfecho excelente, completude da raça/cor e, como resposta, variáveis territoriais e socioeconômicas. Encontrou-se acentuada melhora da qualidade do preenchimento no período, especialmente até 2006, sendo excelente a média nacional desde 2007. Nota-se desigualdade territorial em nível municipal. Municípios de IDH baixo/médio, com alta proporção de pobreza e desigualdade tiveram menor chance de ter excelente completude. O modelo ajustado mostra que a região e o tamanho do município são as características que explicam a excelente qualidade da variável raça/cor. Municípios do Nordeste e de pequeno porte têm menos chance de excelente completude. Conclui-se que raça/cor no SIM tem qualidade para ser utilizada nos estudos de desigualdade da mortalidade dos idosos, salvo exceções em nível municipal.

Post-discharge mortality in patients with traumatic spinal cord injury in a Brazilian hospital: a retrospective cohort

STUDY DESIGN

Retrospective cohort.

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the survival outcomes in patients with traumatic spinal cord injury (TSCI).

SETTING

A teaching hospital in Brazil.

METHODS

A total of 434 patients diagnosed with TSCI (2004-2014) were included. Overall survival, standardized mortality ratios (SMR), and causes of death were assessed by Student's t-test, χ² test, Kaplan-Meier analysis, and Cox proportional-hazards regression.

RESULTS

The mean follow-up was 4.8 years (±3.3 years). Individuals with tetraplegia had a median survival of 11 years, with participants in the paraplegia group not reaching median survival. The overall mortality rate was 37 per 1000 person-years. Age-adjusted SMR was 28.8 (95% CI: 22.8-36). There were 77 deaths with 56 defined causes, of which pneumonia was the most frequent (35.7%). Combined infectious etiologies caused 55.3% of deaths. Multivariate analysis revealed higher mortality among individuals with tetraplegia vs. paraplegia in the first 2 years post injury (HR = 8.28, 95% CI: 2.76-24.80), after 2 years post injury (HR = 2.35, 95% CI: 1.31-4.24), and in all years combined (HR = 3.36, 95% CI: 2.04-5.52).

CONCLUSION

Mortality among patients with TSCI was 28.8 times higher than in the reference population. In more than half of the cases, the cause of death was linked to infectious diseases. Pneumonia caused two times more deaths in individuals with tetraplegia than in individuals with paraplegia, with a higher impact in the first 2 years post injury. Reported findings indicate the need for a surveillance and prevention program with emphasis on vaccination and respiratory rehabilitation.

Scientific production on falls and deaths among elderly persons: a bibliometric analysis

Abstract Objective: To map international scientific production on falls and deaths among the elderly. Method: A bibliometric study of academic papers was carried out in the ISI Web of Knowledge/Web of ScienceTM. The search terms "elderly*", "fall*" and "death*" were used for studies between 1990 and 2016. Articles from events or those still in the editing process and studies in the form of "conference proceedings", "editorial material" and "letters" were excluded, with only finished studies and complete "articles" and "reviews" considered. Results: After applying the refinement filters, 668 articles were identified during the 26 year evaluation period, published in 364 different journals indexed to the database in question. These were written by 2,958 authors with links to 1131 research institutions located in 63 countries. The articles included 22,093 references, with an average of approximately 33 references per study. Conclusion: The articles on falls and deaths among the elderly emphasize the need for more specific studies on the subject and its potential for exploration in future research. This study revealed the need for this issue to be discussed in the training of health professionals, as it represents an opportunity to deconstruct and reconstruct concepts and values that are established throughout the life of individuals, such as care related to the avoidability of falls, to improve the quality of life of this population.

Qualifying information on deaths and serious injuries caused by road traffic in five Brazilian capitals using record linkage

INTRODUCTION

Road traffic crashes (RTC) are an important public health problem, accounting for 1.2 million deaths per year worldwide. In Brazil, approximately 40,000 deaths caused by RTC occur every year, with different trends in the Federal Units. However, these figures may be even greater if health databases are linked to police records. In addition, the linkage procedure would make it possible to qualify information from the health and police databases, improving the quality of the data regarding underlying cause of death, cause of injury in hospital records, and injury severity.

OBJECTIVE

This study linked different data sources to measure the numbers of deaths and serious injuries and to estimate the percentage of corrections regarding the underlying cause of death, cause of injury, and the severity injury in victims in matched pairs from record linkage in five representative state capitals of the five macro-regions of Brazil.

METHODS

This cross-sectional, population-based study used data from the Hospital Information System (HIS), Mortality Information System (MIS), and Police Road Traffic database of Belo Horizonte, Campo Grande, Curitiba, Palmas, and Teresina, for the year 2013 for Teresina, and 2012 for the other capitals. RecLink III was used to perform probabilistic record linkage by identifying matched pairs to calculate the global correction percentage of the underlying cause of death, the circumstance that caused the road traffic injury, and the injury severity of the victims in the police database.

RESULTS

There was a change in the cause of injury in the HIS, with an overall percentage of correction estimated at 24.4% for Belo Horizonte, 96.9% for Campo Grande, 100.0% for Palmas, and 33.2% for Teresina. The overall percentages of correction of the underlying cause of death in the MIS were 29.9%, 11.9%, 4.2%, and 33.5% for Belo Horizonte, Campo Grande, Curitiba, and Teresina, respectively. The correction of the classification of injury severity in police database were 100.0% for Belo Horizonte and Teresina, 48.0% for Campo Grande, and 51.4% for Palmas after linkage with hospital database. The linkage between mortality and police database found a percentage of correction of 29.5%, 52.3%, 4.4%, 74.3 and 72.9% for Belo Horizonte, Campo Grande, Palmas, Curitiba and Teresina, respectively in the police records.

CONCLUSIONS

The results showed the importance of linking records of the health and police databases for estimating the quality of data on road traffic injuries and the victims in the five capital cities studied. The true causes of death and degrees of severity of the injuries caused by RTC are underestimated in the absence of integration of health and police databases. Thus, it is necessary to define national rules and standards of integration between health and traffic databases in national and state levels in Brazil.