The Unbooked Pregnant Woman: Experience From A Rural Tertiary Hospital South-South Nigeria

This retrospective study was carried out to determine the obstetric outcome of unbooked pregnant women who presented at the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital over a five year period. Five thousand nine hundred and sixty two women presented at the labour ward out of which 617 (10.3%) were unbooked. Majority of the patients were multiparous (61.2%) and the most common clinical presentations were obstructed labour (28.8%) and eclampsia (19.8%). There were 255 still births and 5 early neonatal deaths resulting in a perinatal mortality rate of 420/1000. Maternal mortality ratio was 7,800/100,000 live births and this was mostly from eclampsia (28.8%) and obstetric haemorrhage (19.8%). Grass-root education in our various communities highlighting the importance and advantages of formal antenatal care and the inclusion of this in the health education curriculum of primary and secondary schools is advocated. KEY WORDS: Unbooked pregnant women, Uyo, obstetric outcome