Background: Over the last two decades, video-assisted surgery has become the preferential access route for many procedures. Despite cholecystectomy being the laparoscopic procedure most frequently performed in Brazilian public hospitals from 2008 to 2012, the lack of population-based studies led us to conduct a survey on the prevalence of video-assisted surgery in the treatment of patients using the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS) (Unified Health System), which is the universal, free, and public healthcare system of Brazil.

Methods: By analyzing the DATASUS (national public health registry database), the prevalence of laparoscopic cholecystectomy and open cholecystectomy (OC) was calculated in the period from January to December in 2008, 2010 and 2012, taking into consideration their geographic distribution throughout Brazil.

Results: At the end of the study period, an increase in the number of laparoscopic cholecystectomies was observed, with a variation of 125.7 %. However, OC was more prevalent despite an increase in the use of video-assisted surgery over the 5-year study period, increasing from 12 to 25 % in 2012.

Conclusions: In spite of a trend toward increased use of video-assisted surgery for treating SUS patients during the period under study, the data from 2012 are still far from being ideal. For this population, OC via laparotomy is still the most prevalent option in all regions. This information must encourage the Brazilian surgical societies to push for an improvement in the supply of the treatment provided by the public health system.