Effect of prenatal counselling on compliance and outcomes of teenage pregnancy

Abstract

To evaluate the effect of prenatal counselling on compliance for health promotion and pregnancy outcomes we conducted an experimental randomized control study on a sample of 86 teenage pregnant women attending the maternal and child health centre in Elkhosos village, Egypt. Data were collected pre-counselling, post-counselling and after delivery. At the post test, women in the study (counselling) group showed statistically significantly greater knowledge and compliance of health promotion (P < 0.001) than women in the control group. In the study group, 90.7% were full term at labour compared with 41.9% in the control group; 88.4% of the women in the study group had normal vaginal delivery compared with 76.7% of those in the control group. The health condition in 90.7% of the study group neonates was classified as good compared with only 46.5% in the control group. Only 9.3% of the study group babies had low birth weight compared with 32.6% of the control group babies (P = 0.008).