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Socio‐economic Status and pregnancy outcome. An Australian study
Author(s) -
MORRISON J.,
NAJMAN J. M.,
WILLIAMS G. M.,
KEEPING J. D.,
ANDERSEN M. J.
Publication year - 1989
Publication title -
bjog: an international journal of obstetrics and gynaecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.157
H-Index - 164
eISSN - 1471-0528
pISSN - 1470-0328
DOI - 10.1111/j.1471-0528.1989.tb02389.x
Subject(s) - pregnancy , medicine , socioeconomic status , occupational prestige , social class , prospective cohort study , statistical significance , gestational age , demography , apgar score , parity (physics) , cohort study , obstetrics , environmental health , population , genetics , physics , surgery , particle physics , pathology , sociology , political science , law , biology
Summary A prospective cohort of 8556 pregnant women attending the Mater Misericordiae Mothers' Hospital in Brisbane was examined to consider the impact of socio‐economic Status on pregnancy outcome. The indicators of socio‐economic Status selected were family income, maternal education and paternal occupational Status. Pregnancy out‐comes considered were preterm delivery, low birthweight, low birth‐weight for gestational age, and perinatal death. Subsidiary analyses were also undertaken for Apgar scores, time to establish respiration, need for mechanical respiration and admission to intensive care. Before adjustment, the main consistent association was between the occupational Status of the father and three measures of perinatal morbidity. Initial adjustment for the mother's socio‐demographic background and weight/height ratio reduced the strength and statistical significance of the above associations, while further adjustment for lifestyle variations between the three Status groups further reduced the above associations to marginal statistical significance. The findings suggest that observed dass differences in pregnancy outcome are attributable to the mother's personal characteristics (height/weight 2 , parity) and her lifestyle.