Utiliza？？o de cuidados de saúde pela popula？？o idosa portuguesa: uma análise por género e classes latentes

introduction: in the context of an ageing population, in which the elderly already account for 17.8% of the portuguese population, the objective of this study is to identify the determinants of health care utilisation by this group and estimate their impact. materials and methods: data come from the last two waves of the national health survey (1998/99 and 2005/06). latent class models are used, being the analysis further disaggregated by gender. results: the class of high users is relatively larger for women (14% which compares to 12% for the case of men) but their average number of doctor visits is lower (3.15 for women and 4.07 for men). some independent variables appear as statistically significant such as region of residence, living alone, working and several need variables. on the other hand, income, double coverage and age are not statistically significant. the same happens to risk factors such as obesity and hypertension. conclusions: in the case of low users, some barriers to utilisation of health care seem to persist. positive discrimination should be considered for some preventive care in order to maintain the autonomy and quality of life of elderly people. regarding high users, in general, the variables included in the study were not statistically significant.