Objective:

to describe the causes of hospitalization of Brazilian children under five years old.

Methods:

this is a systematic review of articles published from 2008 to 2015, searched in the databases Medline and LILACS; selected studies were critically analyzed through a validated instrument.

Results:

eleven articles were included, four of them are ecological and seven are cross-sectional studies; respiratory diseases (n=5), parasitic infections (n=4) and perinatal diseases (n=2) were the main causes for hospitalizations in the reviwed articles; in the studies that analyzed the sensitive conditions, pneumonia (n=6), gastroenteritis (n=5), and asthma (n=5) were the mais causes pointed out.

Conclusion:

respiratory, parasitic and perinatal diseases revealed to be the main causes for hospitalizations in Brazilian children; pneumonia, gastroenteritis, and asthma constitute the most important of hospitalizations, treatable in the ambulatory health care.

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