Investigation of the Risk of Low Birth Weight infants for pregnant mothers with a path analysis model

Background: Since Low birth weight (LBW) is significantly related to infant mortality and it is one of the most important health indices at birth, this study was conducted to determine the most important factors affecting the low birth weight and their direct and indirect effects on response variable.Objectives: Our aim, in the present paper, was to present a new statistical framework for analysis based on path analysis techniques.Patients and Methods: To accomplish this analytical cross-sectional study, a checklist containing mother and infant’s demographic and pregnancy information was employed. Those with the weight of less than 2500g were considered as LBW infants. The information related to the next infant born with normal weight was also recorded. Overall, 466 pieces of information related to mothers and infants were recorded. Then, probable causal paths were theoretically drawn and path coefficients were calculated by LISREL 8.8.Results: Obviously exactly half of the infants were LBW, and the remainder were normal. The percentage of IUGR among mothers who had preterm delivery was 19, while this percentage for mothers who had term delivery was 11.5 (P value = 0.167). Path analysis revealed that the most effective factor on LBW was preterm delivery. The chance of LBW would incredibly increase with the occurrence of preterm delivery. Preterm delivery has a significant and direct effect on LBW (p value < 0.001), and its positive sign of path coefficient shows that if it occurs, the probability of LBW will increase, the second important was IUGR, the results showed unexpected pregnancy had direct effect on LBW but this wasn’t significant (P value = 0.292). The third important factor was pregnancy age and its negative path coefficient showed that the chance of LBW decreased with increase in the pregnancy age.Conclusions: LBW chance can be controlled by accurate controlling of pregnancy and prevention of unnecessary pregnancy termination.

کلیدواژه ها:

Path Analysis ، Low Birth Weight ، Pregnancy