ANTENATAL CARE AND NEONATAL MORTALITY AND MORBIDITY IN THREE HOSPITALS OF PUNJAB, PAKISTAN

Objective: To find out the association between neonatal morbidity & mortality and the number of ante-natal visits of the mother of the newborn. Study Design: Comparative cross-sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICUs) of three military hospitals of the Punjab province, from Jan to Mar 2019.Methodology: Data of all newborns (total of 3065 neonates) delivered in selected Military Hospitals, and all newborns admitted to Neonatal Intensive care units, of Military Hospitals born in same hospital (in born) and born outside the Military Hospital (out born) during this period along with their mothers was collected. Neonatal morbidity and mortality in the selected hospitals was recorded. Mothers were classified as booked and unbooked according to the number of antenatal care visits. Data was analyzed by Statistical Packages for Social Science (SPSS) version 20. Results: Neonatal morbidity including prematurity, low birth weight, birth asphyxia, neonatal sepsis, pneumonia, diarrhoea, congenital malformation, and fits was significantly less (p-value <0.001) in children whose mothers had at least 4 or more antenatal visits (booked) than those newborns whose mothers had less than 4 antenatal visits (unbooked). The neonatal mortality in booked mothers was less than half of that in unbooked mothers. Conclusion: Booked mothers had better outcomes in terms of neonatal health and survival, and the neonatal health and survival was strongly correlated with the number of antenatal visits of the mother.