The IBGE closed on Friday, 13, the data collection of the National Survey of Health - PNS, started on August 26 last year. In order to portray the health and well-being of the Brazilian population, nearly 1,500 survey agents visited more than 100 thousand households in nearly two thousand municipalities in Brazil.

The PNS investigates the prevalence of non-communicable chronic diseases and quantifies the population with physical disabilities. Other important indicators are related to lifestyle (sedentarism, smoking, diet, alcohol consumption) and oral health.

Maria Lucia Vieira, IBGE´s coordinator of Labor and Income, explains that, after the data collection, the phase of analysis and construction of the indicators begins in order to provide the first thematic release, Primary Health Care, on July 31 this year.

"The PNS will release four or five results, two in 2020 and the others up to the end of the first semester of 2021. The second theme scheduled will be on Chronic Diseases and Lifestyles, to be released in October. The third one should be Health Indicators and Labor Market, scheduled to be released in December. The last two themes are yet to be defined", lists Vieira.

Besides assessing data related to the health of the citizens, a household survey included for the first time ever, at national level, a module of questions to help assessing the quality of the primary health care services. Such survey will also allow international comparisons.

The PNS went into the field for the first time in 2013, resulting in four thematic releases between December 2014 and June 2016. Nevertheless, the IBGE had already been carrying out an investigation cycle every five years since 1998, with the health supplements of the former National Household Sample Survey - PNAD, updated to the Continuous PNAD.

The PNS 2019 includes new themes, like paternity, male participation in prenatal, sexual activity and work conditions. The survey also investigates whether the residents suffered any kind of violence and follows up the accomplishment of preventive examinations. The PNS also collected the anthropometric data – weight and height – of one of the residents of the households visited, in order to detect the incidence of obesity and establish the medians of weight and height of the population.

"It is expected that the survey is carried out every five years with results for Brazil, Major Regions, Federation Units, metropolitan areas and capitals for some indicators", adds Vieira.

Partnerships with Ministry of Health enable surveys in area

Eduardo Marques Macário, director of Analysis of Health and Surveillance of Non-Communicable Diseases of the Ministry of Health, informs that a covenant was signed in 2018 between the Ministry and the IBGE to fund the PNS and the National Survey of School Health - PeNSE, whose data began to be collected in April last year and is scheduled to be released in the second semester this year.

"The PNS is a key survey to the Ministry to establish public policies through a series of indicators that follow up the health situation. In addition, it produces data to be delivered to the Worldwide Health Organization - WHO, especially about the risk factors related to non-communicable chronic diseases, which represent nearly 70% of the causes of mortality in the whole world", explains Macário.

Now, more three surveys are scheduled in the health sector through a new covenant signed with the Ministry of Health in December 2019. The Ministry will transfer R$30 million to the IBGE to create the new modules of the Continuous National Household Sample Survey - Continuous PNAD, as well as the National Survey of Demography and Health - PNDS and the Survey of Medical-Sanitary Assistance - AMS.

"Based on the cooperation with the IBGE, we will use their expertise in household data collection to have data periodically available in order to subsidize both the formulation and implementation of the public policies of the Ministry", highlights Caroline Martins, deputy secretary of Primary Health Care of the Ministry of Health.

What comes next

IBGE´s Maria Lucia Vieira informs that the Continuous PNAD will have two supplements. The first, Primary Health Care, will be collected in all the households of the Continuous PNAD in the third quarter. It will focus on the attendance to children aged under 13 years. The second module, Child Development, will assess aspects related to four domains: motor, cognitive, language and socioemotional capacities of children aged between two and three years.

"The first module is directed to caregivers of those aged under 13 years. We want to assess the quality of the primary care based on a survey with the population to assess the supply, access and completeness of the attendance", explains Caroline Martins. "The second supplement, directed to children aged between 24 and 36 months, aims at producing a validated instrument and a diagnosis of the child development with the objective of mapping the demand for the formulation of public policies for the early childhood.

The IBGE will also carry out the National Survey of Demography and Health - PNDS, in partnership with the Ministry of Health. The PNDS was released in 1986, 1996 and 2006, though it is the first time that the IBGE carries it out. The new edition will update the information and provide relevant data and indicators for the context of the health of women and children. "The analysis will be expanded for children aged up to five years and will investigate women conditions, focused on breeding, breastfeeding and nutritional health", adds Martins.

The third covenant, the Survey of Medical-Sanitary Assistance - AMS was last edited 11 years ago. Vania Maria Pacheco, IBGE´s manager of Social Studies and Surveys, informs that the AMS raises the health establishments with and without hospitalization, assessing equipment and human resources.

"The objective of the Ministry of Health is to know its establishments. The survey will be carried out within three years, beginning with the registration update. The establishments with hospitalization will be raised in 2022 and those without hospitalization, in 2023, though they do not have a scheduled release date", says Vânia Pacheco.