Gynecology & Obstetrics
Open Access
ISSN: 2161-0932
ISSN: 2161-0932
Tigist Bekele, Abdela Amanon and Kahsay Zenebe Gebreslasie
Background: The birth of a preterm infant results in significant health consequences to the infant and emotional and economic costs for families and communities. About 75% of perinatal deaths and 50% of neurological abnormalities are directly attributed to preterm. The main aim of this study was to assess the prevalence and associated factors of pre-term birth North West Ethiopia. Methods: An institutional based cross sectional study was conducted. Systematic sampling was used to get the total sample size of 422 participants. The data was entered, cleaned and edited using EPI INFO version 2002 and exported to SPSS version 16.0 software packages for analysis. Both bivariate and multiple logistic regression were fitted and odds ratio and 95% CI were computed to identify associated factors and determine the strength of association. A p-value of <0.05 was considered as statistical significant. Result: This study showed that 11.6% from the total 422 mothers gave a preterm birth. Presence of chronic illness (AOR=4.5; 95% CI: 2, 10.2), problem in current pregnancy (AOR=2.9; 95% CI: 1.3, 6.7), premature rupture of membrane (AOR=6.2; 95% CI: 2.7, 14),low income <600 birr (AOR=2.6 ; 95% CI: 1.1, 6.6),has antenatal follow up (AOR=0.24; 95% CI: 0.09, 0.6), and hematocrit level <33 (AOR=7.2;95CI:3.1-16.8) were found to be significantly associated with preterm birth on the multi variate logistic regression. Conclusion: Prevalence of preterm birth was found to be higher in Debremarkos town. The main factors for this were maternal history of chronic illnes, problem in current pregnancy, presence of premature rupture of membrane, low income, has no antenatal follow up and hematocrit level <33.