A comparative study of adult and adolescent maternal care continuum following community-oriented interventions in Cambodia, Guatemala, Kenya, and Zambia

Background The coverage for reproductive care continuum is a growing concern for communities in low- income economies. Adolescents (15–19 years) are often at higher odds of maternal morbidity and mortality due to other underlying factors including biological immaturity, social, and economic differences. The aim of the study was to examine a) differences in care-seeking and continuum of care (4 antenatal care (ANC4+), skilled birth attendance (SBA) and postnatal care (PNC) within 24h) between adult (20–49 Years) and adolescents and b) the effect of multilevel community-oriented interventions on adolescent and adult reproductive care-seeking in Cambodia, Guatemala, Kenya, and Zambia using a quasi-experimental study design. Methods In each country, communities in two districts/sub-districts received timed community health worker (CHW) household health promotion and social accountability interventions with community scorecards. Two matched districts/sub-districts were selected for comparison and received routine healthcare services. Results Results from the final evaluation showed that there were no significant differences in the care continuum for adolescents and adults except for Kenya (26.1% vs 18.8%, p<0.05). SBA was significantly higher for adolescents compared to adult women for Guatemala (64% vs 55.5%, p<0.05). Adolescents in the intervention sites showed significantly higher ANC utilization for Kenya (95.3% vs 84.8%, p<0.01) and Zambia (87% vs 72.7%, p<0.05), ANC4 for Cambodia (83.7% vs 43.2%, p<0.001) and Kenya (65.9% vs 48.1%, p<0.05), SBA for Cambodia (100% vs 88.9%, p<0.05), early PNC for Cambodia (91.8% vs 72.8%, p<0.01) and Zambia (56.5% vs 16.9%, p<0.001) compared to the comparison sites. However, the findings from Guatemala illustrated significantly lower care continuum for intervention sites (aOR:0.34, 95% CI 0.28–0.42, p<0.001). The study provides some evidence on the potential of multilevel community-oriented interventions to improve adolescent healthcare seeking in rural contexts. The predictors of care continuum varied across countries, indicating the importance of contextual factors in designing interventions.

RNA profiles reveal signatures of future health and disease in pregnancy

Maternal morbidity and mortality continue to rise, and pre-eclampsia is a major driver of this burden1. Yet the ability to assess underlying pathophysiology before clinical presentation to enable identification of pregnancies at risk remains elusive. Here we demonstrate the ability of plasma cell-free RNA (cfRNA) to reveal patterns of normal pregnancy progression and determine the risk of developing pre-eclampsia months before clinical presentation. Our results centre on comprehensive transcriptome data from eight independent prospectively collected cohorts comprising 1,840 racially diverse pregnancies and retrospective analysis of 2,539 banked plasma samples. The pre-eclampsia data include 524 samples (72 cases and 452 non-cases) from two diverse independent cohorts collected 14.5 weeks (s.d., 4.5 weeks) before delivery. We show that cfRNA signatures from a single blood draw can track pregnancy progression at the placental, maternal and fetal levels and can robustly predict pre-eclampsia, with a sensitivity of 75% and a positive predictive value of 32.3% (s.d., 3%), which is superior to the state-of-the-art method2. cfRNA signatures of normal pregnancy progression and pre-eclampsia are independent of clinical factors, such as maternal age, body mass index and race, which cumulatively account for less than 1% of model variance. Further, the cfRNA signature for pre-eclampsia contains gene features linked to biological processes implicated in the underlying pathophysiology of pre-eclampsia.

Early- and Late-Onset Preeclampsia at a Tertiary Hospital in 2016

Introduction: Preeclampsia is still one of the major causes of maternal morbidity and mortality worldwide. Preeclampsia nowadays has another classification, early-onset preeclampsia and late-onset preeclampsia. This study aimed to evaluate the differences between early-onset and late-onset preeclampsia in Dr. Soetomo General Hospital, Surabaya in 2016.Methods: This was an analytic observational study, evaluating the difference between early- and late-onset preeclampsia in terms of maternal data, medical history, and obstetric history. The samples were taken from the medical record of Dr. Soetomo General Hospital, Surabaya from January until December 2016.Results: In maternal data, early- and late-onset preeclampsia mostly happened in productive age, consisted of 34 patients of early-onset preeclampsia (77.3%) and 31 patients of late-onset preeclampsia (73.8%). Early-onset preeclampsia tended to happen in nullipara (42.2%) and primigravida (35.6%) women, and late-onset preeclampsia usually happened in multipara (43.9%) and multigravida (85.4%) women. In medical and obstetric history, early-onset preeclampsia mostly had a history of hypertension (61.7%), rather than late-onset preeclampsia (32.7%). Moreover, there were no significant differences in other variables.Conclusion: Early-onset and late-onset preeclampsia had a significant difference in parity, gravidity, and hypertension disease.

Study of feto-maternal outcome in patients with hepatitis E infection during pregnancy

Background: Hepatitis E is considered as a common cause of high maternal morbidity and mortality particularly in third trimester and also high perinatal morbidity and mortality. Thus, this study is conducted to evaluate the feto-maternal outcome in patients infected with hepatitis E during pregnancy.Methods: It is a retrospective observational study conducted in department of obstetrics and gynecology at L. G. hospital. Fifty pregnant women with clinical hepatitis in third trimester of pregnancy were included in this study and thorough investigation were carried out. Patients were monitored till postpartum period and fetal monitoring data were collected from neonatal ICU.Results: In this study, majority of pregnant patients with hepatitis B were admitted during monsoon season suggests that HEV outbreaks are more common during monsoon months. Majority of the patients (70%) were emergency cases. Majority of these patients (82%) were belonged to lower socio-economic class. Co-infection with HAV was in 2% and with HBV in 4%. S. bilirubin >15 mg/dl in 16% of patients. PT and APTT were raised in 28% of patients. FDP was raised in 70% of patients. 76% were delivered vaginally and 22% were delivered by LSCS. Most common complication in HEV infected pregnant women was disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) (26%). Maternal mortality rate is 14%. Out of 50 patients, 88% delivered live baby, out of which 72% needed NICU admission. Perinatal mortality rate was as high as 28%.Conclusions: Hepatitis E infection and pregnancy is a deadly and fatal combination. Specifically, in 3rd trimester of pregnancy, acute hepatitis E has a grave prognosis with high maternal morbidity and mortality. Prevention is the mainstay of controlling HEV especially in developing countries.

E-Postpartum mobile application to increase postnatal knowledge care

Background: During this pandemic, maternal health services must still be considered because it is feared that there will be an increase in postpartum maternal morbidity and mortality. Postpartum care knowledge is vital for postpartum mothers to maintain their condition, so it is necessary to make an application that helps mothers through the E-Postpartum application.Objective: The study aims to develop and test the E-Postpartum mobile application to increase knowledge of postnatal care.Method: This study employed Research & Development consisting of 4 stages, namely Literature Study, Development Stage, Validity Expert, and Trial.Results: The E-Postpartum mobile application has six features, starting from education about postpartum care to consultation. The trial results showed that the application effectively increased the knowledge and action of postpartum mothers (p <0.001).Conclusion: The E-Postpartum application is beneficial for health workers in providing education, especially for postpartum mothers in carrying out care during the postpartum period. This postpartum application will make it easier for mothers to check their condition and make it easier for midwives to detect early and control the mother's condition even remotely.

African traditional abdominal massage in pregnancy resulting in antepartum uterine rupture, abruptio placenta and foetal demise – a case report

The practice of abdominal massage dates to years ago and associated with foetal and maternal morbidity and mortality when undertaken by untrained traditional birth attendants in our setting. We present a 30-year old G3P2+0 with uterine rupture and intra-uterine foetal death following abdominal massage. She was resuscitated and had emergency exploratory laparotomy and repair of uterine rupture.

Determinants of reversible contraceptive method discontinuation among women of reproductive age in Kano metropolis, Nigeria

Contraceptive discontinuation contributes substantially to the total fertility rate, unwanted pregnancies and induced abortions thereby increasing the already high maternal morbidity and mortality. This study aimed to access contraceptive discontinuation among women of reproductive age in Kano metropolis. Using a cross-sectional study design with concurrent mixed method of data collection, 350 women were studied. Data was collected using a structured interviewer administered questionnaire, focus group discussion and key informant interview guides. Of the 350 participants, 168 of them had discontinued a method of contraception giving a total discontinuation rate was 48%, with method specific discontinuation rate of 35.1% for implants, 33.9% for injectables, 21.4% for pills, and IUD having the lowest rate (15.5%). The study also found side effects to be the most common reason why women discontinued contraception (67.1%), intention to get pregnant (59.5%), method failure (16.7%), method switch (12.0%), and husband’s disapproval (9.5%). Factors significantly associated with discontinuation at bivariate level were ethnicity, influence on method choice, type of facility where method was obtained, and the type of contraceptive method. These factors were found not to be significant at multivariate level. Contraceptive discontinuation is prevalent in Kano metropolis, meaning that women are at high risk of unintended, mistimed pregnancies, and unsafe abortions, increasing maternal morbidity and mortality. Efforts should be made to tackle the problem of discontinuation through effective educational strategies and counselling techniques.

TRADITION PATTERNS OF ANTENATAL CARE AND MATERNAL HEALTH IN MAMFE: UNDERSTANDING THE SOCIO-CULTURAL FACTOR OF MATERNAL MORTALITY IN RURAL CAMEROON

From the case study of Mamfe, this research has been tailored to highlight and examine the influence of traditional patterns of antenatal care on maternal morbidity and mortality in rural Cameroon. The country is one of the underachievers of the MDGs with strong socio-cultural attachment and a consequential high reliance on traditional patterns for antenatal care. Understanding the influence of this reliance gives a more complete view of the socio-cultural factor critical towards underlining the underlying determinants of maternal deaths. The rationales behind most traditional antenatal beliefs and practices, some of which have been highlighted in this work, scarcely correspond to the biomedical norms for useful maternal healthcare. They reportedly fulfill more superior and collective purposes that understandably prevail over maternal health. Non-respect for these traditional imperatives puts transgressors at odds with the community. Given their understandable vulnerability during pregnancy, expectant women are therefore predisposed to a higher risk of complications and death. The research was both cross-sectional and exploratory, constructed on a qualitative design. Non-probability purposive sampling was used to constitute a sample size of 140 participants. Research techniques employed included in-depth interviews, FGDs and direct observation. We discovered that expectant women widely attended conventional antenatal consultations but were rigorously constraint to respect and adhere to beliefs and practices for traditional maternal care. As such widespread facility-based deliveries in rural settings heralded as the ideal solution by many does not necessarily limit the influence of the socio-cultural factor on MMR. KEY WORDS: rural Cameroon, traditional patterns, influence, antenatal care, maternal mortality