Years of life lost by mortality: a component of the burden of disease

Introduction The register of death by cause, sex and age groups of resident s in 1994 in Rio Grande do Sul (RS) and Santa Catarina (SC), two Brazilian southern states, were studied to calculate the years of life lost (YLL), on e of the two components that summarize disability adjusted life years (DALY ), in RS, SC and Brazil. Methods The methodology employed is the same used in the Global Burden of D isease study to quantify the mortality component (YLL) of DALY in the world . Results The results show that the greatest proportion and rates caused by G roup II (Noncommunicable diseases), linked with more advanced stages of the epidemiological transition, in RS, SC and Brazil. But in both states and e specially in Brazil, Group I (Communicable, maternal, perinatal and nutriti onal conditions) causes an important proportion of YLL. The Group III (Inju ries) was the second more important group in RS and SC and the third in Bra zil. Road traffic accidents are particularly important in SC, where the int entional injury rate is half than the one in RS. The leading causes of YLL were road traffic accidents, ischemic heart disease and cerebrovascular dis ease in SC, and ischemic heart disease, cerebrovascular disease and road tr affic accidents in RS. Conclusions Death certification in the southern region of Brazil has a comp lete coverage and miscoded death proportion is small, providing a reliable mortality information. DALY allow comparing fatal and nonfatal health outco mes to determine the importance of different diseases and to establish heal th priorities. DALY are also an useful tool to identify disadvantage groups , target health interventions and provide information for social control of resource allocation.