The New Indian Journal of OBGYN 3(1)

A prospective observational study to assess maternal and foetal outcome in underweight pregnant women

Aakanksha Singhal, Swati Kochar

ABSTRACT

Objective: To assess the pregnancy outcome in underweight pregnant women and recommended preventable measures. Methodology: This prospective study is done between January to December 2014 in P.B.M Zanana Hospital, S.P Medical college Bikaner. About 400 pregnant women who were registered in antenatal clinic were included. Relevant history was taken, women were assessed during pregnancy and followed till puerperium. Result: The incidence of underweight pregnant women was 17.2% in randomly selected 1000 pregnant women in ANC clinic of our hospital. Most of underweight women (61%) had poor weight gain (<5kg) during pregnancy with mean weight gain 5.48 kg. 78% of underweight pregnant women had moderate anaemia with mean Hb 8.64 gm/dl. The p value was equal to 0.0001. They had increased risk of delivering low birth weight (LBW) babies (28.5%) with mean birth weight 2.62 kg in underweight women (p value =0.0001). Poor weight gain in pregnancy in underweight pregnant women also had increased risk of delivering LBW babies (36%). Conclusion: Our study population has higher prevalence of underweight pregnant women (17.2%) compared to European (8%) and American (3.4%) data. In light of data from our study we conclude better antenatal care services, better nutrition, and better health education and improve awareness that underweight women have increased risk of adverse maternal and fetal outcome during and after pregnancy. So underweight is emerging problem like obesity, poses a challenge to health care providers for giving and living standards in society for reduction of adverse perinatal outcome.