Abstract

VASCONCELOS, Marina Pereira de; BRAGA, Cynthia; GOUVEIA, Giselle Campozana  and  SOUZA, Wayner Vieira de. Pilgrimages in Juazeiro do Norte, Ceará, Brazil: profile of demand for healthcare assistance and seasonality of hospitalizations. Epidemiol. Serv. Saúde [online]. 2015, vol.24, n.1, pp.39-48. ISSN 1679-4974.

OBJECTIVE: to describe the morbidity pattern among pilgrims and investigate seasonal hospitalization variation in periods of pilgrimage in Juazeiro do Norte, Ceará, Brazil. METHODS: a cross-sectional study with medical assistance data during the November 2nd 2012, All Soul’s Day pilgrimage; and an ecological time series study to investigate hospitalization seasonality between 2007 and 2012; seasonal indexes (SI) were calculated. RESULTS: among the 377 assisted pilgrims, most of them were more than 55 years old (53.5%) and looked for medical assistance to measure blood pressure (71.1%); seasonal hospitalization increase was observed for respiratory diseases in April (SI=1.40, 95%CI 1.13-1.67), May (SI=1.21; 95%CI 1.03-1.40) and June (IS=1.30; 95%CI 1.04-1.55), and for circulatory diseases in June (SI=1.23; 95%CI 1.16-1.31), July (SI=1.15; 95%CI 1.06-1,24) and August (SI=1.09; 95%CI 1.06-1.11). CONCLUSION: the morbidity pattern with prevalence of circulatory diseases was compatible with the age of pilgrims; there was no increase in hospitalizations in the period of pilgrimage.

Keywords : Morbidity; Health Services Accessibility; Temporal Distribution; Epidemiology, Descriptive.

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