Quality of care for children under two years of age in Brazil’s basic network in 2018: indicators and associated factors

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the quality of care for children under two years of age in the primary health care network with data from the external evaluation of the Program for the Improvement of Access and Quality of Primary Care in 2018. METHODS: Users who had children under two years of age who were in the unit at the time of data collection were eligible for the study. The quality of care was evaluated using a synthetic indicator built with questions from the users’ module. The exposure variables were: region, structure of basic health units, and staff process. A univariate analysis was performed and crude and adjusted prevalence ratios were estimated. RESULTS: The sample was composed of 15.745 users who had children under the age of two years. Only 36.8% (95%CI 36,0–37,6) of users were classified as having received good quality care for their children, with a downward trend in prevalence as the child’s age increased. Better results were observed in the Northeast region, in units that presented all the inputs and vaccines and for teams that used protocols and materials, kept records, performed active search and healthy eating actions. CONCLUSION: The prevalence of good quality of care for children under two years of age was low. These data can be useful for managers’ decision-making and for the implementation of actions aimed at professionals, that encourage a higher quality of care to children, mainly the child leaving a consultation with the next appointment scheduled and a first consultation being carried out until their seventh day of life.