Epidemiological study of bucomaxilofacial trauma in a Paraíba reference hospital.

OBJECTIVE: to study the epidemiological data of patients suffering from buccomaxillofacial trauma treated at a referral hospital in the State of Paraíba.

METHODS: we conducted a cross-sectional study of inductive approach, with a comparative statistical procedure and research technique by field direct documentation. The sample comprised hospital records obtained from January 2016 to December 2017 of patients attended by the Service of Buccomaxillofacial Surgery and Traumatology of this hospital, and consisted of 332 patients according to the study's eligibility criteria. Two previously calibrated examiners collected and analyzed the data, both descriptively and inferentially.

RESULTS: males sustained the majority of facial trauma (83.1%), mainly in the third decade of life (32.2%). Motorcycle accidents were the most common etiology of trauma for both genders. In relation to inferential statistics with a margin of error of 5%, there was no significant association (p>0.05) between the genders and the trauma etiological factors. The bones of the nose (38.2%) were the most affected bones and the most frequent soft tissue injury was edema, in 50.9% of cases. Only 20.8% of the patients with bone fractures were polytraumatized.

CONCLUSION: the victims of oral and maxillofacial trauma attended at our hospital are predominantly men in the third decade of life, involved in motorcycle accidents and sustaining lesions in the nose bones nose.