Social inequalities in spatial distribution of hospital admissions due to respiratory diseases

To verify social inequalities in hospital admissions due to respiratory diseases in Salvador, Bahia State, Brazil, 2001-2007, an ecological study was conducted with information zones as the units of analysis. Information zones were stratified according to living conditions and analyzed by Poisson regression. Spatial distribution of hospitalization rates due to respiratory diseases ranged from 3.3 to 80.5/10,000. Asthma, pneumonia, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) showed heterogeneous spatial patterns, in which strata with the worst living conditions showed higher hospitalizations rates. The hospitalization rate for respiratory diseases was 2.4 times higher in zones with very low living conditions as compared to the wealthiest zone. There was a reduction in inequalities in hospital admissions for pneumonia and an increase for asthma and COPD. The sharp social gradient supports the hypothesis that socioeconomic factors are determinants of hospitalizations for respiratory diseases.