Profile of pregnant adolescents and their newborns in a southern Brazilian municipality

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: to describe the profile of pregnant adolescents and their newborns in a municipality in southern Brazil. METHOD: this is a cross-sectional descriptive study. Data collection was performed on the basis of data from declarations of live births in the municipality between the months of January to December 2018. The data were analyzed with the aid of the SPSS version 21.0 program. To assess the association between numerical variables, Pearson or Spearman linear correlation tests were used. The level of significance adopted was 5% (p <0.05) using measures of central tendency of variability, absolute and relative frequencies. The results presented through graphs and tables. RESULTS: out of 2,974 birth records, 445 were from teenage mothers, resulting in a quantity of (15%) teenage pregnancies. Most adolescents had an average observed age of 17.5 years, (62.5%) were white, (92.8%) were single. As for education, 61.6% had completed elementary school and (87%) occupied the home. CONCLUSIONS: an expressive number of pregnant adolescents was evidenced, observing the need to implement family planning strategies for adolescent pregnancy prevention programs. The study also made it possible to identify the statistically significant association between the number of prenatal consultations and the birth weight of neonates in a positive way for the age of the pregnant women and the context of life.