Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2006 Dec;24(4):508-18.

Immediate and early postnatal care for mothers and newborns in rural Bangladesh

Uzma Syed  1 , S k Asiruddin, M S I Helal, Imteaz I Mannan, John Murray
Affiliations

Immediate and early postnatal care for mothers and newborns in rural Bangladesh

Uzma Syed et al. J Health Popul Nutr. 2006 Dec.

Abstract

The study evaluated the impact of essential newborn-care interventions at the household level in the Saving Newborn Lives project areas. Two household surveys were conducted following the 30-cluster sampling method using a structured questionnaire in 2002 (baseline) and 2004 (endline) respectively. In total, 3,325 mothers with children aged less than one year in baseline and 3,110 mothers in endline from 10 sub-districts were interviewed during each survey. The proportion of newborns dried and wrapped immediately after birth increased from 14% in 2002 to 55% in 2004; 76.2% of the newborns were put to the mother's breast within one hour of birth compared to 38.6% in baseline. Newborn check-up within 24 hours of delivery increased from 14.4% in 2002 to 27.3% in 2004. Postnatal check-up of mothers by trained providers within three days of delivery rose from 2.4% in 2002 to 27.3% in 2004. Knowledge of the mothers on at least two postnatal danger signs increased by 17.2%, i.e. from 47.1% in 2002 to 64.3% in 2004. Knowledge of mothers on at least three postnatal danger signs also showed an increase of 16%. Essential newborn-care practices, such as drying and wrapping the baby immediately after birth, initiation of breastmilk within one hour of birth, and early postnatal newborn check-up, improved in the intervention areas. Increased community awareness helped improve maternal and newborn-care practices at the household level. Lessons learnt from implementation revealed that door-to-door visits by community health workers, using community registers as job-aids, were effective in identifying pregnant women and following them through pregnancy to the postnatal periods.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Map.
Map.
Saving Newborn Lives project areas
Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
Bathing time of newborns after delivery in the SNL project areas by survey years
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
Comparison of mothers' knowledge of at least two maternal danger signs during pregnancy, labour and delivery, and postnatal period and of the newborn
Fig. 3.
Fig. 3.
Postnatal maternal check-up from clinically-trained providers and vitamin A supplements
Fig. 4.
Fig. 4.
Examination of newborns
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Lawn JE, Cousens S, Zupan J. Lancet Neonatal Survival Steering Team. 4 million neonatal deaths: when? Where? Why? Lancet. 2005;365:891–900. - PubMed
    1. National Institute of Population Research and Training . Bangladesh demographic and health survey 2004. Dhaka: National Institute of Population Research and Training; 2005. pp. 145–6.
    1. National Institute of Population Research and Training . Bangladesh maternal health services and maternal mortality survey 2001: final report. Dhaka: National Institute of Population Research and Training; 2003. pp. 29–57.
    1. National Institute of Population Research and Training . Bangladesh demographic and health survey 1999–2000. Dhaka: National Institute of Population Research and Training; 2001. p. 65.
    1. Mitra SN, Al-Sabir A, Cross AR. Bangladesh demographic and health survey 1996–1997. Dhaka: National Institute of Population Research and Training; 1997. p. 252.

Publication types

MeSH terms