Life Is The Riskiest Period For The Neonates Essay

The first week of life is the riskiest period for the neonates. We have found that individual, maternal, intrapartum, household and socioeconomic factors simultaneously influence neonatal mortality. A higher risk of neonatal deaths have been observed among males, multiple gestations, lower gestational age, first born child, higher maternal age, with a history of antenatal or delivery complications, low education level of the mother and poorest household wealth quintile. We have reconfirmed the significance of these known risk factors for neonatal mortality. Among the children who died in the neonatal period, the first day of life was the date of death for nearly one-third of the newborns, more than half of them died within the first two days, and more than three-fourths of the newborns died before completing the first week. First 24 hour period of life is the riskiest period for the neonates of most developing countries and the most critical period for the planning of any child survival program20. Nearly one-fifth of the babies were preterm, similar to a finding of another study from the same site 21. Preterm babies had a higher risk of neonatal mortality; preterm babies could be the proxy for low birth weight (LBW) babies, which predisposes them to have an increased risk of infections, hypoglycemia, and hypothermia 22. Globally, prematurity is one of the leading causes of neonatal deaths 23, 24. Prevention and management of prematurity are crucial to reducing