Cataract prevalence in Brazil demonstrated in ten years

Abstract

Purpose : Cataract is the leading cause of reversible blindness in the world, which stands for 47.8% of all blindness cases. Even though it is a disease with great functional, physic and socioeconomic impacts, there are few epidemiologic studies about cataracts in Brazil. This transversal quantitative study, therefore, aims to evaluate the cataracts prevalence in Brazil according to the informatics department of the unique health system (DATASUS).

Methods : The cataract cases in Brazil were analyzed over a 10 years period (2004-2014), using as source DATASUS. All patients at the age range of 0 to 85 assisted by ambulatory service and registered by DATASUS were included, totaling 182.242.824 registries in a population of 182.060.108 to 202.768.562 inhabitants (2004 – 2014). There were also used data about a population of 182.060.108 to 202.768.562 inhabitants (2004-2014) available in the informatics department of Brazilian institute of geography and statistics (IBGE). The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics with the software SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) version 2.0 and Excel.

Results : The cataract rate analysis notified by DATASUS and from general population supplied by IBGE between the years 2004 and 2014 has shown few variation of frequency among the years. During the analyzed years the highest prevalence rate was of 14.72% of the Brazilian population, related to the year 2014. Taking sex into account, the relative risk (RR) calculated in 2014 was 0.731 (IC95% 0.731 to 0.732) woman to every man. In regards to age, the highest prevalence was between 70 to 79 years old (1.005%) and the least affected group was between 10 to 19 years old (0.004%).

Conclusions : This study verified that the prevalence of cataracts notified cases in Brazil, during the analysis period, was rather stable, with maximum rates of 0.16% of the population. There were higher occurrences rates for females and ages between 70 and 79 years old. Although the DATASUS information system needs to be improved, it’s a very important tool to collect data in order to develop better health policies, specially in regards to cataracts.

This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2016 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Seattle, Wash., May 1-5, 2016.