A study on the incidence and the outcome of teenage pregnancies and the associated socio-economic factors: an interim analysis

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Teenage pregnancy is known to be associated with adverse pregnancy outcomes for both the mother and her offspring. Knowledge on the socio-economic conditions associated with teenage pregnancy and the short term and intermediate outcomes would provide information useful in prevention and management of teenage pregnancy. OBJECTIVE: To describe the prevalence of teenage pregnancy in a low risk population and two identified high risk populations and to identify the associated socio-economic characteristics as well as to assess the incidence of short term and intermediate adverse outcomes in the mother and the offspring. METHODS: The study will be conducted in three phase. The prevalence of teenage pregnancy and associated socio-economic factors would be assessed at three study settings of Ragama, Nuwara Eliya and Puttalam. Second phase would be at Ragama and the pregnancy outcome of the teenage mothers would be compared against a parity matched sample of controls while in phase three a community based follow up study would be done in teenage mothers who delivered at Ragama Hospital two years ago to assess the intermediate outcome of mothers and their offspring. Here we report the results of the Ragama component of Phase I and a part of the data accumulated for Phase II. RESULTS: Review of records of 5249 deliveries yielded a teenage pregnancy rate of 4.74% (n=249). Results pertaining to 25 subjects and 50 parity matched controls in phase I and 102 subjects with 179 controls are described here. The distribution according to religion and ethnicity was not different between the subjects and the controls. The occupations and marital status as well as alcohol consumption of fathers did not demonstrate a difference between the teenage mothers and the controls. Five percent of subjects were not married while all were married in the control group (p<0.05). There was a significant difference in the educational level between subjects and controls (p<0.001); education beyond Ordinary level was 14% in subjects as compared to 33% among