A prospective study of neonatal complications and birth defects in Pakistan

Abstract

Worldwide 7.6 million children died in 2010 before reaching their 5th birthday. Pakistan has the 3rdhighest rate of neonatal mortality. There are several reasons for neonatal death so it is important to investigate the factors and causes behind this tragedy. The aim of current study was to determine the most commonly occurring diseases in neonates and causes behind them. Data was collected from different hospitals and about 150 neonates were selected for analysis. The analysis shows that female babies correspond to 56% as compared to male that is 44%. The premature cases reported were 24% while the rest were mature/ normal. At delivery time, 48% infants were under-weight.66% of the babies were delivered via C-Sections while 26% by Episiotomy and remaining case were of Normal Vaginal Delivery (NVD).According to this study 46% of babies were normal and 42% were present with some complication whereas12% of infants were born with several birth defects. The most prevailing conditions in neonates were birth asphyxia, hypothermia, sepsis respiratory arrest, moaning ultimately death. So it is important to focus on antenatal care, effective referral system, increasing the literacy rate to minimize such complications can be avoided.