COMPLETENESS OF RECORDS OF DEATHS BY COVID-19 IN RECIFE, PERNAMBUCO, 2020-2021

Abstract

The objective of this study was to describe the incompleteness of death records due to covid-19 in Recife, Pernambuco, 2020 and 2021. This is a descriptive and exploratory study on the incompleteness of deaths due to covid-19 registered in the Information System on Mortality (YES). The incompleteness of the variables gender, age group, race/skin color, education, marital status and place of death was described based on absolute and relative frequencies and excellent scores (<5%); good (5 to 9.9%); regular (10 to 19.9%); poor (20 to 49.9%) and very poor (≥50%). 32,104 deaths were registered in the SIM, 7,194 (22.4%) of which were caused by infectious and parasitic diseases and among those belonging to this ICD-10 chapter, 5,983 (83.2%) were due to covid-19. All variables were classified as excellent, except for education, which went from fair (13.8%) in 2020 to good (7.1%) in 2021 with a variation of 47.2%. The marital situation improved in incompleteness, going from good (5.0%) to excellent (1.0%), with a change rate of 80.5%. The variables sex, age group and place of death had 100% completion. Most variables showed excellent completeness, which highlights the quality of death records due to covid-19, as well as their maintenance in the context of difficulties experienced in the pandemic.

KEYWORDS: Covid-19. Vital statistics. Health information systems. Epidemiological surveillance.