Validation of physician certified verbal autopsy using conventional autopsy: a large study of adult non-external causes of death in a metropolitan area in Brazil.

Background: Reliable mortality data are essential for the development of public health policies. In Brazil, although there is a well-consolidated universal system for mortality data, the quality of information on causes of death (CoD) is not even among Brazilian regions, with a high proportion of ill-defined CoD. Verbal autopsy (VA) is an alternative to improve mortality data.

Deaths of women hospitalized for childbirth and abortion, and of their concept, in maternity wards of Brazilian public hospitals.

The aim of this cross-sectional hospital-based study of 7,845 pregnancies was to analyze deaths of women hospitalized for childbirth and abortion, and fetal and neonatal deaths, in public hospitals in the cities of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Niteroi (RJ), Brazil, in 2011. Outcomes of the pregnancies were: one maternal death, 498 abortions, 65 fetal deaths, 44 neonatal deaths and 7,291 infant survivors. Data were collected through interviews, medical records and the women's pregnancy records, and from the Mortality Information System (SIM).

Rollout of community-based family health strategy (programa de saude de familia) is associated with large reductions in neonatal mortality in São Paulo, Brazil.

Rationale: Several recent studies suggest that Brazil's Estratégia Saude de Familia (Family Health Strategy-FHS) has contributed to declines in mortality at the national and regional level. Comparatively little is known whether this approach is effective in urban populations with relatively easy access to health services.

Objectives: To use detailed medical data collected as part of São Paulo's Western Region project to examine whether the FHS program had an impact on child health in São Paulo, Brazil.