Nutritional Status And Socio-Economic Conditions Influencing Prevalence Of Anaemia In Pregnant Women

Globally, about two hundred million people suffer from anaemia per annum with the highest prevalence rates found among women of reproductive age, infants and young children, and especially those of poor socioeconomic status. This study is a survey-based descriptive study conducted among 400 pregnant women to determine the prevalence of anaemia and the influence of some factors associated with anaemia during pregnancy such as age, socio-economic status, nutrition, awareness, child spacing and spouse’s level of education. The concentration of haemoglobin is collected from analytical data and the personal, nutrition and socio-economical information was recorded using questionnaire interview. The investigation indicated that the prevalence of anaemia was 91.25% among the interviewed women with 27.5% of mildly anaemic (11.0-9.0g/dl), 28.5% moderately anaemic (9.0-7.0g/dl), 32% severely anaemic (7.0-4.0g/dl) and 3.25% very severely anaemic (<4.0g/dl). More studies are needed to explore the cause of the failure to prevent anaemia among pregnant women. The main recommendations of the study included implementing more efforts to improve the quality of health services, improve the awareness about anaemia, improve family planning and birth spacing program to diminish maternal iron losses, intensify measures to improve public awareness and implement an advocacy program to increase utilization of health services.