Abstract
This article aims to analyze indicators of the utilization of oral health services (UOHS) in primary health care in the state of Maranhão, Brazil, before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. We conducted an ecological time series study. The unit of analysis was the state of Maranhão, and the exposure variable was the COVID-19 pandemic, dichotomized into pre-pandemic and pandemic. The outcome variables were the monthly rates per 1,000 population of three UOHS indicators: rate of preventive procedures (RPP-PHC); rate of urgent procedures (RUP-PHC), and rate of curative procedures (RCP-PHC). The data were collected from the Primary Health Care Information System (SISAB) and the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) for the period from 2015-2022. The analyses were performed using the Seasonal Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (SARIMA) model. The three indicators showed an upward trend up to January 2019. The pandemic caused a significant reduction in the RPP (Xreg = -6.55; p-value = 0.0008) and RCP (Xreg = -4.74; p-value = 0.0005), starting in the first semester of 2020 and continuing into the second semester of 2022, but did not influence the RUP (Xreg = -0.03; p-value = 0.12). The COVID-19 pandemic caused a reduction in preventive and curative oral health services in Maranhão.
Key words:
COVID-19; Oral Health; Primary Health Care; Interrupted Time Series Analysis