Outpatient service profile in a plastic surgery clinic in Southern Brazil

Objective: To describe the outpatient service profile in a plastic surgery clinic in southern Brazil. Materials and Methods: It was conducted a descriptive, exploratory and quantitative study in order to analyze the total outpatient service (consultations and surgeries) performed in a private plastic surgery clinic in the period from January 1th to December 31th of 2010. Results: It was observed that from 671 (60,5%) new consultations, only 205 (18,5%) surgeries were performed. March was the month with the highest number of consultations (10%) and surgeries (11,7%). Of the total of new consultations, the reparative ones were prevalent in 55,6% of the cases, followed by the esthetic with 33,7%. The average age was 37 years and the women were predominant. The ages ranged from 8 months to 89 years. The married patients represented the majority of surgeries (49,8%)and there was a predominance of adult patients (31-59 years) with 316 patients (47,1%). Unimed was the health insurance plan more used (49,3%) in the consultations; the most frequent surgical procedures were excisions and/or scraping of skin disorders and attachment 70 (33,1%), followed by mammoplasty (augmentation mammoplasty, mastopexy, gynecomastia). Conclusion: Although most of the surgical service were exeresis of congenital deformities and/or acquired, the result is not far from the reality found in the rest of Brazil, with a predominance of women and large number of breast implants. The studied clinic is an institution that provides conditions for the feasibility of outpatient care, considering the numerous advantages offered by this method.