The Occurrence and Repercussions of Late Prematurity and Early Term Birth in Sergipe, Brazil

Abstract

We studied the maternal and neonatal characteristics of three gestational age groups in maternity hospitals of Sergipe, Northeast, Brazil: late preterm infants-LPTI (34-36 weeks and 6 days) early-term infants-ETI (37-38 weeks and 6 days) full-term infants-FTI (39-41 weeks and 6 days). This is a sectional and descriptive study including all maternity hospitals in operation in the state of Sergipe, performed from June to October/2015. There were 11 maternity hospitals in total, 7 in country-side and 4 in the Aracaju, and 5 public, 2 private and 4 public/private funded. We included 729 motherinfant dyads with 397 from Aracaju and 332 from the countryside. There was no difference among the groups regarding the type of birth, parity and other characteristics regarding the newborn and their mothers, with the exception of maternal age, younger in the groups with shorter gestational age (p<0.001). There were more admissions before labor on the ETI group compared to the FTI group (p<0.001).There was a decreasing trend for morbidities like transient tachypnea (p<001) and jaundice using phototherapy (p=0.024), as with use of CPAP (p=0.004) and NICU hospitalization (p=0.043) as the gestational age increases. We also found that the shorter the gestational age is (p<0.001) exclusive breastfeeding decrease at hospital discharge. These findings show an increase in morbidities and the need for interventions for the groups that are close to term and the