Outpatient and inpatient dental care for patients with disabilities in Brazil's public healthcare system: A population-based approach from 2014 to 2023.

Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate outpatient and inpatient dental care for patients with disabilities from 2014 to 2023.

Material and methods: A time series analysis was carried out with data from Brazil's public healthcare system, considering the outpatient productivity of Special Needs Dentistry specialists and hospitalizations (inpatient admissions) of patients with disabilities for dental procedures, both normalized to every 100,000 inhabitants (incidence). The significance level was set at 5%.

Results: In the last 10 years, 22,420,859 procedures were carried out and 89,380 hospitalizations were approved. Trend analysis showed no significant temporal variation in the incidence of both variables. Regarding the procedures, the majority were low-complexity (82.1%, p < .001) and clinical (71.2%, p < .001). Periodontal (19.9%) and restorative (19.5%) procedures were the most frequent. Considering the hospitalizations, almost (R$) 40 million was allocated, and the majority were classified as elective (71.9%, p = .002) and of short duration (less than a day).

Conclusion: Dental care for patients with disabilities presented patterns related to the types of procedures, complexity and circumstance, in addition to not showing significant temporal variation over the last 10 years.