Prenatal Care in Latin America

Prenatal Care in Latin America

    Presenter(s)

    Siobhan Kathleen Kenny, Molly Anne Quinn

    Description

    Each year, 529, 000 women worldwide die from complications during pregnancy and childbirth, of these 529,000 deaths 22,000 are from Latin America and Caribbean regions (Lubbock & Stephenson, 2008). Nicaragua, one of Latin America’s poorest countries, has a high maternal death rate due to lack of access to services, high fertility rate among a young reproductive age group, complications from unsafe abortions, postpartum hemorrhage, hypertension, and sepsis (Lubbock & Stephenson, 2008). Unlike Nicaragua, Cuba, a fellow Latin American country, has strict policies and procedures for prenatal care. Cuba’s use of the polyclinic, a multidisciplinary professional team that works closely with mothers and children in the community, allows for expecting mothers to have access to basic medical care, such as universal screenings and annual checkups, as well as access to medical educational materials and other necessary preventative care. A preventative approach to prenatal care includes prioritizing and tracking high risk pregnancies, and setting national standards that make the life expectancy at birth on par with western nations (Bragg et. al, 2012). As a result of Cuba’s approach, their maternal mortality rate is on the decline while Nicaragua’s’ in on the rise. The purpose of this poster is to describe the prenatal care disparities between Latin American countries, and offer some strategies to combat this problem.

    Publication Date

    4-24-2019

    Project Designation

    Capstone Project

    Primary Advisor

    Thomas E. Herchline, Kathleen C. Scheltens

    Primary Advisor's Department

    Pre Med Program

    Keywords

    Stander Symposium project

    Prenatal Care in Latin America

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