Pregnant Women's Knowledge and Expectations about Prenatal Ultrasound: A Cross-Sectional Study

Ultrasound imaging has been shown to improve maternal health outcomes through timely diagnosis of pregnancy problems. Despite ultrasound being vital for women's management in pregnancy, studies have reported low awareness among African women.

To evaluate the knowledge and expectations of pregnant women in Harare about prenatal ultrasound.

A cross-sectional survey of 385 pregnant women was done at the ultrasound department of a private maternity hospital in Harare, Zimbabwe. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) 27.0 and Windows Excel were used to analyse the data.

The majority of women (85.4%) concurred that ultrasound scans are important during pregnancy, but most (79.3%) were not aware that congenital abnormalities can be detected through ultrasound. Despite low overall knowledge of congenital abnormalities, 80.2% of women were familiar with Down's syndrome, and this knowledge tended to increase with higher education levels, although not statistically significant (linear-by-linear association = 0.057). The primary expectation of ultrasound scans among pregnant women was to confirm the expected delivery date, and gender determination, with the least expectation being a diagnosis of congenital abnormalities.

Knowledge levels were lower in our setting relative to other similar studies, and hence this underscores the need for further public education.