Contribution of the Unified Health Care System to mammography screening in Brazil, 2013

To estimate the coverage of opportunistic mammography screening performed via the Brazilian Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS, Unified Health Care System), at the state and regional level, in 2013.

This was an ecological study in which coverage was estimated by determining the ratio between the number of mammograms performed and the expected number of mammograms among the population of females between 50 and 69 years of age. The number of mammograms performed in the target population was obtained from the Outpatient Database of the Information Technology Department of the SUS. To calculate the expected number of mammograms, we considered 58.9% of the target population, the proportion that would be expected on the basis of the recommendations of the Brazilian National Cancer Institute.

In 2013, the estimated national coverage of mammography screening via the SUS was 24.8%. The mammography rate ranged from 12.0% in the northern region to 31.3% in the southern region. When stratified by state, coverage was lowest in the state of Pará and highest in the state of Santa Catarina (7.5% and 35.7%, respectively).

The coverage of mammography screening performed via the SUS is low. There is a significant disparity among the Brazilian states (including the Federal District of Brasília) and among regions, being higher in the south/southeast and lower in the north/northeast.