Prevalence of neonatal screening and associated factors in Brazil: a comparison of the 2013 and 2019 National Health Surveys

Abstract

This study analyzed the prevalence of complete neonatal screening (CNS) of children aged under 2 years in Brazil and associated factors using data from the 2013 (n=4,442) and 2019 (n=5,643) national health surveys. We conducted a cross-sectional study to compare prevalence of CNS (eye, ear and heel prick tests) adopting 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) and a 5% significance level. Crude and adjusted Poisson regression was performed to estimate prevalence ratios (PR) and 95%CI to assess the association between socioeconomic, demographic and health variables and CNS. There was a statistically significant increase in CNS prevalence, from 49.2% (95%CI: 47.1-51.3) in 2013 to 67.4% (95%CI: 65.5-69.3) in 2019. However, large disparities persist across states and between sociodemographic groups. In both years, CNS prevalence was lowest among brown and black children, those from families in the three lowest income quintiles, children without health insurance, those from families registered in the Family Health Strategy and children living in the North, cities outside the state capital/metropolitan regions and rural areas. Despite the increase in prevalence of CNS, deep individual and contextual inequalities persist, posing challenges for health policies.

Key words:
Neonatal screening; Children’s health; Health inequalities