Effect of Pre-pregnancy Maternal Body Mass Index on Obstetric Outcomes in a Tertiary Care Hospital in Goa, India

Maternal body mass index (BMI) is a vital predictor of the nutritional status of any pregnant woman. Several developing countries like India are facing the double burden of both obesity and malnutrition due the extreme socioeconomic distribution of our population. Thus, this study was undertaken to study the effect of pre-pregnancy maternal BMI on the obstetric outcomes.

A retrospective observational study was conducted during the time period of 1 year (December 2018-December 2019), wherein we analysed 3940 women who delivered in Goa Medical College. Depending on the maternal BMI calculated at the first antenatal visit, all the study participants were divided into five BMI groups and their obstetric outcomes were studied.

Majority of the study participants were in the normal BMI category (49.8%); however, a large number of women were overweight (37.3%), 3.2% were obese, 0.1% were morbidly obese, and 9.6%were underweight. Antenatal complications like anaemia and IUGR were more common in underweight women, whereas pre-eclampsia, GDM, macrosomia, antepartum haemorrhage and preterm labour were more common in obese women. Increased rate of Caesarean sections and postpartum complications like PPH, wound sepsis and puerperal sepsis were observed in overweight and obese women.

Thus, adverse obstetric outcomes were observed in extremes of maternal BMI. Hence, there is a need to provide pre-conception counselling to all women in the reproductive age group so that they can achieve normal BMI prior to conception and thus reduce maternal morbidity and mortality rates in our country.