The sensitivity of malnutrition diagnosis using the SIAB and active search of cases

Abstract

Both the Primary Care System and the Family Health Program are responsible for promoting and maintaining the health of the child population by providing full care and follow-up. For enabling the health teams to carry out their work it is fundamental to analyze the health status of the population covered by the system. The Primary Care Information System (SIAB) is a priceless instrument for this purpose. The goal of this study is to demonstrate the sensitivity of protein-calorie malnutrition diagnosis performed by the Family Health Teams when only using the SIAB as data source and when performing active search of children from 0-23 months and 29 days of age, taking their anthropometric data. This cross-sectional study was carried out in the municipality of Patos de Minas (State of Minas Gerais), from January to April 2005. The prevalence of protein-calorie malnutrition informed by the SIAB found by teams A and B was of 2.35% and 2.5% respectively. The prevalence of malnutrition found by teams A and B through active search, collection of anthropometric data and weight/age ratio calculation were 14.12% and 13.75% respectively. This prevalence rate was higher than that described by the National Demographic and Health Survey, which was 5.7%. The prevalence of protein-calorie malnutrition based on weight/age ratio exclusively using the SIAB as a data source results in an underdiagnosis of this health problem. Seen that the SIAB is a territorialized information system designed for allowing elaboration of population indicators in well defined areas of coverage, the authors propose a critical and constant evaluation of these data. The authors also suggest active search of all cases, involving the entire health team.