Search

Background The World Health Organization recommends participatory learning and action (PLA) in women’s groups to improve maternal and newborn health, particularly in rural settings with low access to health services. There have been calls to understand the pathways through which this community intervention may affect neonatal mortality. We examined the effect of women’s groups on key antenatal, delivery, and postnatal behaviours in order to understand pathways to mortality reduction. Methods and findings We conducted a meta-analysis using data from 7 cluster-randomised controlled trials that took place between 2001 and 2012 in rural India (2 trials), urban India (1 trial), rural Bangladesh (2 trials), rural Nepal (1 trial), and rural Malawi (1 trial), with the number of participants ranging between 6,125 and 29,901 live births. Behavioural outcomes included appropriate antenatal care, facility delivery, use of a safe delivery kit, hand washing by the birth attendant prior to delivery, use of a sterilised instrument to cut the umbilical cord, immediate wrapping of the newborn after delivery, delayed bathing of the newborn, early initiation of breastfeeding, and exclusive breastfeeding. We used 2-stage meta-analysis techniques to estimate the effect of the women’s group intervention on behavioural outcomes. In the first stage, we used random effects models with individual patient data to assess the effect of groups on outcomes separately for the different trials. In the second stage of the meta-analysis, random effects models were applied using summary-level estimates calculated in the first stage of the analysis. To determine whether behaviour change was related to group attendance, we used random effects models to assess associations between outcomes and the following categories of group attendance and allocation: women attending a group and allocated to the intervention arm; women not attending a group but allocated to the intervention arm; and women allocated to the control arm. Overall, women’s groups practising PLA improved behaviours during and after home deliveries, including the use of safe delivery kits (odds ratio [OR] 2.92, 95% CI 2.02–4.22; I2 = 63.7%, 95% CI 4.4%–86.2%), use of a sterile blade to cut the umbilical cord (1.88, 1.25–2.82; 67.6%, 16.1%–87.5%), birth attendant washing hands prior to delivery (1.87, 1.19–2.95; 79%, 53.8%–90.4%), delayed bathing of the newborn for at least 24 hours (1.47, 1.09–1.99; 68.0%, 29.2%–85.6%), and wrapping the newborn within 10 minutes of delivery (1.27, 1.02–1.60; 0.0%, 0%–79.2%). Effects were partly dependent on the proportion of pregnant women attending groups. We did not find evidence of effects on uptake of antenatal care (OR 1.03, 95% CI 0.77–1.38; I2 = 86.3%, 95% CI 73.8%–92.8%), facility delivery (1.02, 0.93–1.12; 21.4%, 0%–65.8%), initiating breastfeeding within 1 hour (1.08, 0.85–1.39; 76.6%, 50.9%–88.8%), or exclusive breastfeeding for 6 weeks after delivery (1.18, 0.93–1.48; 72.9%, 37.8%–88.2%). The main limitation of our analysis is the high degree of heterogeneity for effects on most behaviours, possibly due to the limited number of trials involving women’s groups and context-specific effects. Conclusions This meta-analysis suggests that women’s groups practising PLA improve key behaviours on the pathway to neonatal mortality, with the strongest evidence for home care behaviours and practices during home deliveries. A lack of consistency in improved behaviours across all trials may reflect differences in local priorities, capabilities, and the responsiveness of health services. Future research could address the mechanisms behind how PLA improves survival, in order to adapt this method to improve maternal and newborn health in different contexts, as well as improve other outcomes across the continuum of care for women, children, and adolescents., In a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials, Nadine Seward and colleagues find that in Asian and African settings with limited access to medical services, participatory learning women’s groups are associated with improved perinatal health behaviors., Author summary Why was this study done? A systematic review and meta-analysis of trials of participatory learning and action in women’s groups found a 25% reduction in neonatal mortality associated with these groups, but the pathways to improved survival have not been explored using available evidence from all trials. We used data from cluster-randomised trials of women’s groups to explore behaviours in the antenatal, delivery, and postnatal periods in order to better explain the reduction in neonatal mortality associated with these groups. We also examined whether women who were assigned to the intervention arm and attended group meetings were more likely to have improved care practices than women who were also in the intervention arm but did not attend group meetings. What did the researchers do and find? We conducted a meta-analysis using individual-level data to explore the relationship between women’s groups and key behaviours in the antenatal, delivery, and postnatal periods. Our findings suggest that women’s groups are able to improve key behaviours for home deliveries including clean delivery practices and thermal care practices. To determine whether women who attended group meetings were more likely to have improved behaviours compared with women who did not attend, we compared behaviours between these women separately for the different trials. Overall, we found that women who attended group meetings were more likely to have improved behaviours than women who did not attend. What do these findings mean? Our meta-analysis showed that women’s groups were associated with improvements in critical practices including clean deliveries and appropriate thermal care for home deliveries. Evidence suggests that these care practices are essential for reducing neonatal mortality because of the importance of sepsis and hypothermia in areas with high neonatal mortality and low rates of facility births. Although this finding explains how women’s groups improved survival in these contexts, we also found that women’s groups improved survival in areas with lower neonatal mortality, such as rural Bangladesh and rural Malawi. It is possible that women’s groups were able to help families make more timely, better informed decisions about care seeking. Women’s groups have demonstrated flexibility in adapting to a shifting environment to improve birth outcomes through important pathways. Key to the continued reduction in adverse birth outcomes will be sustained improvement in community-level practices, as well as ensuring that health facilities are equipped to support quality care.

A pooled analysis of data from three studies in South Asia demonstrates an association between use of clean delivery kits during home births and reduced risk of neonatal mortality., Background Sepsis accounts for up to 15% of an estimated 3.3 million annual neonatal deaths globally. We used data collected from the control arms of three previously conducted cluster-randomised controlled trials in rural Bangladesh, India, and Nepal to examine the association between clean delivery kit use or clean delivery practices and neonatal mortality among home births. Methods and Findings Hierarchical, logistic regression models were used to explore the association between neonatal mortality and clean delivery kit use or clean delivery practices in 19,754 home births, controlling for confounders common to all study sites. We tested the association between kit use and neonatal mortality using a pooled dataset from all three sites and separately for each site. We then examined the association between individual clean delivery practices addressed in the contents of the kit (boiled blade and thread, plastic sheet, gloves, hand washing, and appropriate cord care) and neonatal mortality. Finally, we examined the combined association between mortality and four specific clean delivery practices (boiled blade and thread, hand washing, and plastic sheet). Using the pooled dataset, we found that kit use was associated with a relative reduction in neonatal mortality (adjusted odds ratio 0.52, 95% CI 0.39–0.68). While use of a clean delivery kit was not always accompanied by clean delivery practices, using a plastic sheet during delivery, a boiled blade to cut the cord, a boiled thread to tie the cord, and antiseptic to clean the umbilicus were each significantly associated with relative reductions in mortality, independently of kit use. Each additional clean delivery practice used was associated with a 16% relative reduction in neonatal mortality (odds ratio 0.84, 95% CI 0.77–0.92). Conclusions The appropriate use of a clean delivery kit or clean delivery practices is associated with relative reductions in neonatal mortality among home births in underserved, rural populations. Please see later in the article for the Editors' Summary, Editors' Summary Background Worldwide, around 3.3 million babies die in the first month of life, according to data for 2009 from the World Health Organization. Although the global neonatal mortality rate declined by 28% (from 33.2 deaths per 1,000 live births to 23.9) between 1990 and 2009, the proportion of child deaths that are now in the neonatal period has increased in all regions of the world, and currently stands at 41%. This figure is concerning and neonatal mortality remains a big obstacle to the international community in meeting the target of Millennium Development Goal 4—to reduce deaths in children under 5 years by two-thirds from 1990 levels by 2015. At least 15% of all neonatal deaths are due to sepsis (systematic bacterial infection) and an estimated 30%–40% of infections are transmitted at the time of birth. Therefore preventing infections through clean delivery practices is an important strategy to reduce sepsis-related deaths in newborns and can contribute to reducing the overall burden of neonatal deaths. Why Was This Study Done? In South Asia, around 65% of deliveries occur at home, without skilled birth attendants, making practices around clean delivery particularly challenging. To date, evidence on the impact of clean delivery kits and clean delivery practices on neonatal mortality or sepsis-related neonatal deaths from community-based studies is scarce. In this study the researchers explored the associations between neonatal mortality, the use of clean delivery kits, and individual clean delivery practices by using data from the control arms of three cluster-randomized controlled trials conducted among rural populations in South Asia. What Did the Researchers Do and Find? The researchers used data from almost 20,000 (19,754) home births available from the control arms of three community-based cluster-randomized trials conducted between 2000 and 2008 in India (n = 6,841, 18 clusters), Bangladesh (n = 7,041, five clusters), and Nepal (n = 5,872, five clusters). The researchers did not include data from other previously conducted trials on clean delivery practices because of the mix of designs used in these studies and limited their analysis to live-born singleton infants delivered at home in control areas, for whom data on birth kit use were available. The researchers conducted a separate analysis for each country on kit use and clean delivery practices and also analyzed the pooled dataset for all countries while controlling for factors about the mother, the pregnancy, the delivery, and the postnatal period. Using these methods, the researchers found that kits were used for 18.4% of home births in India, 18.4% in Bangladesh, and 5.7% in Nepal. Importantly, according to the pooled analysis, kit use was associated with a 48% relative reduction in neonatal mortality (odds ratio/chance 0.52), which was similar across all countries: 57% relative reduction in neonatal mortality in India, 32% in Bangladesh, and 49% in Nepal. Delivery practices were also important: in the pooled country analysis, the use of a boiled blade to cut the cord, antiseptic to clean the cord, a boiled thread to tie the cord, and a plastic sheet for a clean delivery surface were all associated with significant relative reductions in mortality after controlling for kit use and confounders common to all sites. The researchers found a 16% relative reduction in mortality with each additional clean delivery practice used. What Do These Findings Mean? These findings show that the appropriate use of a clean delivery kit and clean delivery practices could lead to substantial reductions in neonatal mortality among home births in poor rural communities with limited access to health care. The results also reinforce the importance of each clean delivery practice; hand washing and use of a sterilised blade, boiled thread, and plastic sheet were linearly associated with a reduction in neonatal deaths with each additional clean delivery practice used. Costs of such kits are low (US$0.44 in India, US$0.40 in Nepal, and US$0.27 in Bangladesh, although these costs may still be prohibitive for the poorest women), and given the impact of clean delivery kits and clean delivery practices in reducing neonatal practices, such strategies should be widely promoted by the international community. Additional Information Please access these websites via the online version of this summary at http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1001180. A recent PLoS Medicine study by Oestergaard et al. has the latest figures on neonatal mortality worldwide UNICEF has information about progress toward Millennium Development Goal 4 The United Nations Population Fund has more information about safe birth practices The EquiNam web site describes ongoing work on socioeconomic inequalities in newborn and maternal health in Asia and Africa by some of the study authors