Política Nacional de Saúde Bucal:uma análise da reorganização da atenção à saúde bucal no Estado do Rio de Janeiro frente aos incentivos federais

Abstract

This thesis focuses the process of reorganization of the oral care services in Rio de Janeiro State, Brazil. This process is supposed to follow the so called Política Nacional de Saúde Bucal [Brazilian Oral Health National Politics], whose main proposals are to prioritize primary care as part of the Family Health Strategy and to improve secondary care in oral health services in all levels of complexity. The Health Ministry uses financial incentives to stimulate local governments to adopt, under specific conditions, the guidelines to re-organize oral care services. The core of the present thesis is a research on the re-organization of oral care services carried out by the 92 local governments which form Rio de Janeiro State, from January 1998 to December 2007. It analyzes oral health services in all these municipalities. The main conclusions are that re-organization of oral care services following this politics principles and guidelines is an endless process for most of the municipalities being studied. The research also presents, as secondary conclusion, that federal health authorities must act together with other federal, state and local health authorities to improve the population s oral health conditions, as proposed by the Brazilian Oral Health National Politics.