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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