Prenatal care is vital in order to avoid complications during gestation, and women who are healthy enough to become pregnant should begin prenatal visits immediately after discovering that they are expecting.
Prenatal care includes various tests and services designed to prevent birth defects, gestational diabetes, disease and malnutrition for both mother and infant. In addition, counseling on smoking, alcohol or drug consumption; use of folic acid supplements; diet/activity plans with restful periods between; is all provided during prenatal care.
Preventing Birth Defects
Pregnancy is an extremely critical time in both mother and baby’s lives. Many birth defects can be avoided through regular prenatal care and proper nutrition; others cannot, but medical treatments have revolutionized these infants lives so that they now lead healthy, productive lives.
Many birth defects result from changes to genes or chromosomes, which contain instructions on how the body grows and works. These changes could occur as a result of something the mother did during gestation – for instance smoking or drinking alcohol – while in other instances they may result from issues with how a fetus develops such as cleft lip/palate, hearing loss or clubfoot.
Individual prenatal care refers to direct interactions between pregnant women and their obstetric care provider during gestation, childbirth and postpartum. Other women prefer group prenatal models that provide social support and education while still offering risk screening and physical assessment as part of individual care.
Studies indicate that patients receiving group prenatal care benefit significantly more from receiving prenatal services through group models than from receiving care individually, both regarding health knowledge and its development of unborn children, preparation for labor and delivery, as well as overall satisfaction with overall care received. Unfortunately, success of such models depends on recruiting enough eligible patients who qualify to attend such care as well as other factors like meeting space availability and child care availability at their site of delivery.
Preventing Low Birth Weight
Prenatal care can significantly decrease the chances of low birthweight among high-risk mothers. Early and continuous medical visits help women understand normal biological changes during gestation, encourage healthy lifestyle choices and advise them on nutrition during and postpartum. Prenatal care also serves to identify and manage problems that could cause pregnancy complications like high blood pressure or diabetes.
An expert team recently conducted a literature review that revealed the use of prenatal care can significantly decrease rates of low birth weight and associated conditions, regardless of socioeconomic status or risk factors for complications. Furthermore, health systems must make provisions to ensure all pregnant women have access to this form of healthcare.
One way of accomplishing this goal is through group prenatal care for women who share similar health needs and risk factors. Collecting patients together for educational prenatal care sessions allows providers to spend more time on each patient, as well as alleviating financial barriers that prevent some from receiving prenatal care.
Women should visit their practitioner as soon as they discover they are pregnant, attending all prenatal appointments despite not exhibiting any risks or concerns. Prenatal care information can help practitioners target interventions specifically targeting mothers most at risk of having low birth weight babies.
Preventing Premature Birth
Prematurity and its complications are one of the leading causes of infant death worldwide, making its prevention an integral component of ensuring positive health outcomes for new-borns and children. Numerous interventions exist, including access to prenatal care, smoking cessation programs and counseling on good nutrition and breastfeeding practices.
Prenatal care (also referred to as antenatal care) entails regular visits with a health-care provider for the purpose of overseeing a woman’s pregnancy and its outcome, including monitoring foetal development and health during gestation. This care typically includes screening for maternal anemia and serum markers of neural tube defects or some chromosomal abnormalities as well as amniocentesis/chorionic villous sampling for women at increased risk. Counseling may also be provided during this time so as to reduce smoking/alcohol/drug usage during gestation as well as promote healthy living during gestation; vitamin supplementation along with education regarding delivery process/ early newborn care procedures are all part of this care package.
Studies have demonstrated the positive associations between individual antenatal care, which includes one-on-one visits with an obstetrician or health provider, and lower rates of poor perinatal outcomes and its use. Unfortunately, however, racial disparities still persist in terms of initiating and using prenatal care; many women don’t receive their full course of visits either; various models of group prenatal care that provide social services support may offer potential solutions in terms of eliminating disparities.
Preventing Preventable Illnesses
Prenatal care is an investment in both mother and child’s wellbeing. It helps avoid both human and economic costs associated with complications from high-risk pregnancies, including preterm birth, low birth weight babies and infections in both mother and infant. Furthermore, it reduces frequency of maternal deaths/miscarriages/hereditary disease rates- thus saving costs for future generations.
An effective prenatal care system identifies risk factors and existing or potential health problems during pregnany, including screenings for sexually transmitted diseases, blood type and ethnicity; screening fundal height to measure fetal growth; providing education on healthy behaviors to reduce risks; as well as genetic testing (amniocentesis or chorionic villous sampling) to detect hereditary diseases.
While obstetricians typically provide individual prenatal care, recent research indicates that group prenatal care may improve patient outcomes such as providing better education and social support, fewer medical errors, higher patient satisfaction with care and helping address socio-economic disparities in perinatal outcomes such as preterm birth.
Implementing a validated group prenatal care model incurs upfront costs, such as instructor training and site approval by the Centering Healthcare Institute; however, many commercial insurers and some states offer enhanced reimbursement rates for such models. Furthermore, state policies sometimes include incentives that encourage providers and patients to use this format – including pay-for-success arrangements which reward providers when certain outcomes such as lower preterm birth rates are achieved.
