Influence of Physical Activity during Pregnancy on Neonatal Complications: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Newborn hospitalisations after delivery are indicators of poor neonatal health with potential risks of future diseases for children. Interventions to promote a healthy environment have been used during pregnancy, with physical activity as a principal element. A systematic review and meta-analyses were performed to evaluate the effect of physical activity during pregnancy on neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) admissions and Apgar 1 and 5 scores (Registration No.: CRD42022372493). Fifty studies (11,492 pregnant women) were included. There were significantly different rates of NICU admissions between groups (RR = 0.76, 95% CI = 0.62, 0.93; Z = 2.65, p = 0.008; I2 = 0%, and Pheterogeneity = 0.78), and significant differences in Apgar 1 (Z = 2.04; p = 0.04) (MD = 0.08, 95% CI = 0.00, 0.17, I2 = 65%, Pheterogeneity = 0.00001) and Apgar 5 (Z = 3.15; p = 0.002) (MD = 0.09, 95% CI = 0.04, 0.15, I2 = 80%, and Pheterogeneity = 0.00001), favouring intervention groups. Physical activity during pregnancy could help to reduce the risk of NICU admissions that are related to neonatal complications.

Water Aerobic Exercise Improves Mother’s Quality of Life During Pregnancy: A Systematic Review

“…Other studies use different measuring instruments to assess the level of maternal depression such as the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) questionnaire, Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL) questionnaire (Navas et al, 2020;Navas et al, 2021a;Rodríguez-Blanque et al, 2020). This is in accordance with previous research which states that physical exercise can significantly reduce depression in mothers compared to mothers who do not do physical exercise during pregnancy (Sánchez-Polán et al, 2021;Silva-Jose et al, 2023). Preeclampsia is one of the most common causes of maternal death throughout the world.…”