Speech therapy in the urgency and emergency services in Brazil: a historical series of seven years (from 2005 to 2011)

Abstract

Introduction: Currently the urgency and emergency services have specialists that work in a multidisciplinary way with the participation of phonoaudiology (speech therapy) in this process. Objective: To describe the presence of speech therapists in the urgency and emergency services in Brazilian states, in the period from 2005 to 2011. Material and Methods: descriptive study based on the analysis of data published by Departamento de Informática do Sistema Único de Saúde do Brasil (DATASUS). To this analysis, all the phonoaudiologists working in the urgency and emergency services were considered, divided by Brazilian states. Results: In 2005, considering all the 27 Brazilian states, 40.7% of them had phonoaudiologists working in a fi rst-aid clinic. In 2011, 44.4% of these states had these professionals working in emergency care. In 2005, among the existing 9.610 phonoaudiologist in Brazil, 0.39% of this amount worked in urgency and emergency units. In 2011, from the total of 20,390 phonoaudiologist, 0.34% of them work in these units. Conclusion: there was an increase in the number of phonoaudiologists in the urgency and emergency units in the period analyzed, however this increase is insuffi cient to meet the demand in the country.