Pattern of non-communicable diseases during pregnancy and their effect on feto-maternal outcome: A prospective...

To assess patterns of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and pregnancy outcomes of women in a tertiary care hospital.

This was a prospective observational study, conducted over 1 year. All NCDs in women who delivered or aborted were studied. Maternal and neonatal outcomes were noted.

In all, 1003 NCDs occurred in 894 women. Chronic hypertension was the commonest, involving 309 (30.8%) women. Others included cardiovascular (159, 15.9%), neurological (142, 14.2%), endocrine (115, 11.5%), autoimmune (76, 7.6%), chronic kidney (48, 4.8%), and chronic respiratory (43, 4.3%) diseases, psychiatric disorders (38, 3.8%), cancers (20, 2.0%), and chronic liver disease (18, 1.8%). Most (599, 67.0%) were diagnosed before pregnancy and 145 (16.2%), 81 (9.1%), and 69 (7.7%) were diagnosed in the first, second, and third trimesters, respectively. Maternal deaths occurred in 6 (0.7%) women and near miss in 19 (2.1%) women. Only 9 (1.5%) women with NCD diagnosed before pregnancy had maternal near miss or death, compared with 16 (5.4%) diagnosed during pregnancy (P < 0.001). Of live births, 281 (35.3%) were low birth weight, 49 (6.1%) were very low birth weight, and 24 (3.0%) were extremely low birth weight.

Chronic hypertension was the commonest NCD, which along with cardiovascular and neurological disorders constituted around 60% of all NCDs. One-third of NCDs were initially diagnosed during pregnancy. Maternal morbidity was lower if NCDs were diagnosed before pregnancy.