Spatial analysis of leprosy incidence and associated socioeconomic factors

Abstract

The spatial analysis techniques utilized identified the poorer neighborhoods of the city as the areas with the highest risk for the disease. These data show that health departments must prioritize politico-administrative policies to minimize the effects of social inequality and improve the standards of living, hygiene, and education of the population in order to reduce the incidence of leprosy.

Spatial distribution of leprosy in Brazil: a literature review

“…Table 1, Table 2 and Table 3 show the articles' summaries according to the scale used: two evaluated regions/ mesoregions 14,15 ; 13 used the scale of municipalities 10,[16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27] ; 4 evaluated districts [28][29][30][31] ; 6 studied neighborhoods [32][33][34][35][36][37] ; 7 analyzed the census tracts [38][39][40][41][42][43][44] ; and 3 investigated households [45][46][47] . Within each scale, the articles were organized by location: Brazil, Northern, Northeast, Midwest, and Southeast regions.…”

“…Within each scale, the articles were organized by location: Brazil, Northern, Northeast, Midwest, and Southeast regions. In all, 4 approached Brazil 10,16-18 , 7 studied the Northern region or the states of the Amazon region 14,19,20,[38][39][40]45 , 11 focused on the Northeast region [21][22][23]28,[32][33][34][35][36]40,41 , 4 the Midwest region 15,29,37,46 , and 12 the Southeast region [24][25][26][27]30,31,36,37,[42][43][44]47 .…”

“…In the scale of census tracts, it was observed that low socioeconomic levels 42,44 and high population density areas 39,41 showed a positive association with higher incidence.…”

Análise da distribuição geográfica dos casos de hanseníase. Rio de Janeiro, 2001 a 2012

“…Este fato pode indicar, que o acesso ao diagnóstico de hanseníase na população com indicadores socioeconômico pode não estar ocorrendo devido à dificuldade de entrada nos sistemas de saúde. Estudo de Cury et al 29 não encontrou associação entre a incidência de hanseníase e a densidade demográfica, embora tenha identificado clusters de hanseníase e associação com baixos níveis socioeconômicos. Além disso, observou-se disparidade entre os clusters de casos e a localização de serviços de saúde.…”

“…Alguns trabalhos internacionais e nacionais demonstraram a heterogeneidade da distribuição geográfica da hanseníase e os fatores relacionados 5,6,[13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30] . A avaliação da distribuição geográfica permite identificar áreas com maior concentração de casos visando melhor alocação de recursos para o controle da doença.…”