Protocol for an ambidirectional cohort study on long COVID and the healthcare needs, use and barriers to access health services in a large city in Southeast Brazil.

Introduction: Post-COVID-19 condition, or syndrome, also known as long COVID, is an infection-associated chronic condition that can develop after a SARS-CoV-2 infection and last at least 3 months to years. Despite representing a high burden for the Unified Health System (SUS), which has affected millions of Brazilians, it has received limited attention in Brazil. Prevalence studies to date have failed to include a broad representation of the population, and there has been insufficient exploration of the impact on people's lives and the burden of and barriers to accessing health services.

COVID-19 inpatient mortality in Brazil from 2020 to 2022: a cross-sectional overview study based on secondary data.

Background: In Brazil, the COVID-19 pandemic found the universal and public Unified Health System (SUS) with problems accumulated over time, due, among other reasons, to low investments, and disparities in resource distribution. The preparedness and response of the healthcare system, involving the SUS and a private sector, was affected by large socioeconomic and healthcare access inequities. This work was aimed at offering an overview of COVID-19 inpatient mortality during the pandemic in Brazil, exploring factors associated with its variations and, specifically, differences across public, private (for-profit) and philanthropic (private non-profit) inpatient healthcare units, providers, and non-providers of services to the SUS.

Geographical variation in demand, utilization, and outcomes of hospital services for COVID-19 in Brazil: A descriptive serial cross-sectional study.

Objective: To analyze the geographical variation in the provision of health services, namely in demand, patterns of utilization, and effectiveness in the Brazilian Health Regions in four different periods of the COVID-19 pandemic, from February 2020 to March 2021.

Methods: Descriptive serial cross-sectional study based on secondary data on COVID-19 hospitalizations from SIVEP-Gripe, a public and open-access database of Severe Acute Respiratory Illness records collected by the Brazilian Ministry of Health, and COVID-19 case notification data from Brasil.io, a repository of public data.

Patterns of hospital utilization in the Unified Health System in six Brazilian capitals: comparison between the year before and the first six first months of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Objective: To analyze the temporal evolution of the pattern of hospital use in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil.

Methods: This retrospective observational study compared hospital use and mortality in the Brazilian Unified Health System (SUS) in the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic with the year before the onset of the pandemic in six Brazilian capitals (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Manaus, Fortaleza, Recife, and Brasilia). It was based on secondary administrative data from the SUS Hospital Information System (SIH), focusing on the number of hospitalizations per fortnight, age, and gender of patients, hospital length of stay, and the proportions of surgical, elective, with the use of ICU, and resulting in death hospitalizations.

COVID-19 hospitalizations in Brazil's Unified Health System (SUS).

Objective: To study the profile of hospitalizations due to COVID-19 in the Unified Health System (SUS) in Brazil and to identify factors associated with in-hospital mortality related to the disease.

Methods: Cross-sectional study, based on secondary data on COVID-19 hospitalizations that occurred in the SUS between late February through June. Patients aged 18 years or older with primary or secondary diagnoses indicative of COVID-19 were included.

Production of knowledge on policy, planning, and management in Journal Ciência & Saúde Coletiva.

The area of Policy, Planning and Health Management (PPG) express the intersection between research, intervention and political action. The article analyzes the dynamics of knowledge production about PPG in the Journal Ciência & Saúde Coletiva (C&SC) from 1996 to 2019. The study articulates a bibliometric and qualitative approach to explore the profile of articles in three dimensions: thematic, methodological and authorship/institutional partnerships.

[Contributions from the Critical Success Factors model to analysis of the management of Product Development Partnerships in a government laboratory].

Product Development Partnerships (PDP) are one of the measures used by the Brazilian government to incentivize innovation policy, to expand the population's access to strategic medicines, and to reduce the country's technological dependence by strengthening the national pharmaceutical manufacturing base. The study aimed to identify the Critical Success Factors (FCS in Portuguese) for the implementation of these partnerships, using as the reference one of the largest Brazilian government pharmaceutical laboratories. FCS are seen as key areas in which the results must be satisfactory in order to ensure successful performance in the organization or project.

[On the crisis: meanings and perspectives. Interview with Marco Américo Lucchesi].

In this interview, Marco Américo Lucchesi, Tenured Professor of Comparative Literature at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), visiting professor of the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), and member and president of the Brazilian Academy of Letters, outlines his perception of the current crisis and the impact on the consolidation of Brazilian democracy. Based on his experiences as a critic and intellectual, he comments on the attacks on culture and the production of knowledge that we have witnessed in Brazil. He reminds us that no democracy is a fully-fledged ontological reality and highlights the role of schools and universities in mobilizing citizenship and spreading republican values.

Access and effectiveness inpatient care indicators and economic crisis: analysis based on the Brazilian Unified Health System data, Brazil and Southern Brazil states, 2009-2018.

In the context of crisis and resource constraints, it is reasonable to assume the deteriorated weaknesses of the Unified Health System (SUS), such as regional inequalities, underfinancing, and care quality issues. This study explored the application of easily comprehensible and calculated access and effectiveness indicators that could reflect the hospital network crisis. Five indicators extracted from the Hospital Information System, related to Brazil and states of the Southeastern region, were analyzed in the 2009-2018 period: hospitalizations resulting in death; surgical hospitalizations resulting in death; elective surgeries in the total of surgical hospitalizations; hip prostheses in the senior population; and angioplasties in the population aged 20 years and over.

Challenges to the improvement of obstetric care in maternity hospitals of a large Brazilian city: an exploratory qualitative approach on contextual issues.

Background: Maternal morbidity and mortality are still serious public health concerns in Brazil, and access to quality obstetric care is one critical point of this problem. Despite efforts, obstetric care quality problems and sub-optimal/poor outcomes persist. The study aimed to identify contextual elements that would potentially affect the implementation of an obstetric care quality improvement intervention.

Improvement Science: conceptual and theoretical foundations for its application to healthcare quality improvement.

The development and study of healthcare quality improvement interventions have been reshaped, moving from more intuitive approaches, dominated by biomedical vision and premised on easy transferability, to gradually acknowledge the need for more planning and systematization, with greater incorporation of the social sciences and enhancement of the role of context. Improvement Science has been established, with a conceptual and methodological framework for such studies. Considering the incipient of the debate and scientific production on Improvement Science in Brazil, this article aims to expound its principal conceptual and theoretical fundamentals, focusing on three central themes: the linkage of different disciplines; recognition of the role of context; and the theoretical basis for the design, implementation, and evaluation of interventions.

[Evaluation of the Food and Nutrition Surveillance System (SISVAN) in food and nutritional management services in the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil].

The scope of this article is to evaluate the SISVAN as a tool for planning, management and evaluation of food and nutrition actions in primary healthcare in the Unified Health System (SUS). It involved a cross-sectional study composed of a stratified random sample of the municipalities in the State of Minas Gerais. The subjects of the research were municipal officials of SISVAN who filled out a structured questionnaire.

Tuberculosis Control Program and patient satisfaction, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

OBJECTIVE To evaluate factors associated with users' satisfaction in the Tuberculosis Control Program. METHODS A cross-sectional study of 295 patients aged ≥ 18 years, with two or more outpatient visits in the Tuberculosis Control Program, in five cities in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Southeastern Brazil, in 2010. Considering an estimated population of 4,345 patients, the sampling plan included 15 health care units participating in the program, divided into two strata: units in Rio de Janeiro City, selected with probability proportional to the monthly average number of outpatient visits, and units in the other four cities.

[Regulation of radiotherapy and chemotherapy services by health plan organizations in Brazil].

This paper characterizes regulatory procedures applied by private health plan operators on their outpatient radiotherapy and chemotherapy services, especially via contracts, and outlines the health care providers’ perception on regulation. The study relied on primary data, taking into consideration 638 hospitals and outpatient health care units with the services in question. A stratified random sample was selected, resulting in the inclusion of 54 units that are representative of the population, excluding hospitals that only provide radiotherapy.

[The contracting of teaching hospitals in the Brazilian Unified Health System].

This study identifies the potential and limitations of contracting to improve health care management, accountability and quality, and expand the participation of teaching hospitals in the health service network in the context of the Restructuring Program of Teaching Hospitals in the Brazilian Unified Health System. It is a case study of four teaching hospitals and their contracting State Health Departments. According to the hospital managers, the association is weak between contracting and the presence of mechanisms for hospital insertion into the health service network with practices and structures for managerial and healthcare qualification in the hospital.

Implementing clinical guidelines on acute myocardial infarction care in an emergency service.

Background: The implementation of clinical guidelines on acute myocardial infarction (AMI) care produces better results.

Objective: To present a multidisciplinary program to implement these guidelines in a large public emergency center and check its impact.

Methods: Evaluation study on health services, with "before and after" type design, to assess the indicators of quality of AMI care before and after implementation of training strategies and to facilitate emergency teams' acceptance of clinical guidelines.

[Healthcare structure and quality among inpatient care providers for health plans in Brazil].

This study aimed to characterize inpatient care providers for health plans in Brazil, considering that knowledge on healthcare providers is still incipient, particularly in relation to healthcare structure and quality. A national survey was performed, focusing on 3,817 hospitals. A stratified sample of 83 hospitals was selected, and data were collected from September to December 2006 using interviews with hospital administrators.

Mechanisms of microregulation of private hospitals by health plan operators.

Objective: To analyze the mechanisms employed by health plan operators for microregulation of clinical management and health care qualification within care-providing hospitals.

Methods: A nation-wide cross-sectional study was carried out. The universe consisted of hospitals which provided care to health plan operators in 2006.

[Use of clinical guidelines and the results in primary healthcare for hypertension].

This study aimed to identify strategies to implement clinical guidelines for hypertension in a primary healthcare unit, focusing on the effects of the Family Health Program (FHP) and government Pharmaceutical Home Delivery Program (PHDP) on adherence to guidelines by health professionals and the results of care. The data were obtained from a registry of 5,499 hypertensive patients, stratified according to registration in the FHP and PHDP. The random selection procedure resulted in samples of 150 patient charts in three strata and one stratum (without the FHP or PHDP) with only 22 patient charts.

[Utilization of clinical guidelines by health plan operators in the Brazilian health system].

Background: The objective of this study is to present cardiovascular results of a national study about the implementation of clinical guidelines and other instruments and practices for clinical care management among health plan operators in Brasil.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional study based on a representative sample of the 1,573 Brazilian health plan operators, stratified by macro region and market segment. Each stratum was subdivided in take-all and take-some strata by Hedlin's method, with equiprobability selection in each take-some stratum.

[Factors associated with the use of clinical guidelines by health plan operators and their inpatient care providers].

This paper is aimed at identifying factors related to the use of clinical guidelines by health plan operators and their inpatient care providers in the supplementary care sector in Brazil from the viewpoint of managers. The study is based on two national surveys: one involving 90 health plan operators randomly selected from a universe of 1573, oriented towards characterizing the implementation of clinical guidelines and other tools of clinical governance; and another involving 74 hospitals, selected from a universe of 3817 inpatient care providers, aimed at capturing micro-regulation mechanisms applied by health plan operators and their repercussions on hospital practices. Use of clinical guidelines was reported by 32.

[Clinical guidelines and other practices for improving quality of care by health plans from the perspective of their operators in Brazil].

This study aimed to characterize the implementation of clinical guidelines and other instruments and practices for health care quality improvement among health plan operators in Brazil. It was a national cross-sectional descriptive study, initially considering 1,573 health plan operators registered in the National Agency for Supplementary Health Care. The sample design was complex, stratified by macro-region, market segment, and number of beneficiaries.

[An analysis of managed care provided by charitable hospitals in Brazil].

This article describes charitable hospitals in Brazil that provide managed care and the health management organizations themselves, considering the level of autonomy by the latter in relation to the hospitals and their degree of management development, based on a nationwide study. A random sample of individual hospitals was drawn from the hospital groups. After refusals and replacements, the final sample consisted of 112 individual hospitals and 10 hospital groups.