OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the rheumatology outpatients, clinic consultations in the Public Health Services (PHS) in the city of São Paulo. METHODS: Calculation of rate of the programmed rheumatologic consultations, according to 1101 G/M decree, in São Paulo, to the users of PHS. RESULTS: The rate of the programmed rheumatologic consultations was satisfactory, taking into consideration the whole city, but it had an extreme range of variatins on each of the city regions. From the five regions, only two had a satisfactory cover, with a bigger number of consultations for these regions. The others three regions presented a very small execution percentage of the programmed goal. CONCLUSIONS: Although the availability of rheumatologic consultations, in general, was satisfactory, the distribution of this resource was extremely heterogeneous, being the suburbs, the less favorable regions because they have a smaller number of clinics than the other regions that carry out these consultations. The disproportionate number of the consultations in relation to the programmed ones might have its main causes due to: the treatment of people from other cities, a growing number of the citizens becoming PHS users and the probable unsuitable directions to a specialist.
Rheumatologic consultation; programmed goal; city; Public Health Services
