COORDINATION OF CARE FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE PRIMARY HEALTH CARE DENTAL SURGEON

This study analyzed the coordination of dental care for people with disabilities from the perspective of Primary Health Care dentists in a municipality in southeastern Brazil. This is an epidemiological, cross-sectional and analytical study. The target population consisted of 145 dental surgeons working in the municipality's Primary Health Care. A semi-structured questionnaire was used and descriptive and bivariate analyses were carried out using the Chi-square test, with a significance level of 5% (p ≤ 0.05). The results showed that there are weaknesses in the service offered by the oral health team to people with disabilities in relation to the coordination of care and that the majority of interviewees believe it is necessary to carry out training on the subject.  It was also observed that there was a significant association between the Oral Health teams that obtained a high Primary Health Care score and knowledge of how to clinically refer people with disabilities to hospital care with better evaluations of the resolutive and counter-referral services of the Dental Specialty Centers and hospitals for the care of people with disabilities and approval of the municipality's hospital referral flow. The findings of this study point to the need for training for Primary Health Care dental surgeons in coordinating care for people with disabilities and improving communication between the levels of care in the network in order to guarantee the effectiveness of the care offered to people with disabilities in Primary Health Care.