Patterns and Determinants of Birth Weight in Term Babies Delivered at an Urban Multi-Specialty Private Hospital in Southern Nigeria. A Retrospective Cross-Sectional Study

Background: Birth weight is among the most common measures for assessment of intrauterine growth, particularly in developing countries. Aberrations in intrauterine growth can result in profound sequelae in the immediate neonatal period and later in life. In Nigeria, there is generally a poor national summary of abnormal birth weight pattern. Aim of work: To describe the patterns of birth weight and associated factors among term babies delivered in an urban private hospital setting. Patients and methods: This was a single-center cross-sectional study. Records of all babies delivered from January 1 st , 2020, to December 31 st , 2020, were retrospectively reviewed. Preterm deliveries were excluded from the data. Results: There were 411 term deliveries during the study period, 255 vaginal deliveries and 156 caesarean deliveries. 407 babies were from singleton pregnancies and 8 by twin pregnancies. Thirty-one (7.5%) of the term babies had macrosomia and 14 (3.4%) had low birth weights. Bivariate analysis shows statistically significant association between birth weights of term babies and type of gestation (χ 2 – 11.288, p – 0.002) and mode of delivery (χ 2 – 9.718, p 0.035). There was however no association between birth weights and mother’s age or parity and baby’s sex. Conclusions: Our findings show that newborn under-nutrition (LBW) and over-nutrition (HBW) are significant public health problems even among high income mothers in Benin City.