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Purpose: to study the prenatal care among Public Health Service (“Sistema Único de Saúde”) users from Caxias do Sul – RS. Methods: a transversal study of 702 pregnancies attended at the Hospital Geral -Universidade de Caxias do Sul from March 2000 to March 2001 based on the criteria set by the “Programa Nacional de Humanização do Pré-natal e Nascimento (PNHPN)” of the Brazilian Ministry of Health. Results: the observed prenatal coverage was 95.4%, whereas the average of visits was 6.2. The main reported reason for not following prenatal care was the lack of information about its importance (65.6%). In 51.5% of the cases, prenatal care started in the third month of pregnancy, whereas 44.3% of the pregnant women carried out all the proposed complementary tests. Prenatal care was considered inappropriate in 64.8% and appropriate in 35.2% of the cases. The quality of prenatal attention was significantly associated with the mother’s education, as well as with the number of previous deliveries. The higher the educational level, the better the quality of observed prenatal care (p=0.0148). In addition, the higher number of previous deliveries showed to be associated with a later beginning of prenatal care and a lower number of visits (p=0.0008). Conclusions: the prenatal care available at Caxias do Sul in spite of its good coverage, should be reviewed in terms of quality. Special attention should be given to education in health along the prenatal assistance.