Findings show even patients adhering to prenatal care receive an average of six of eight guideline-based services<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n
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MONDAY, Oct. 25, 2021 (HealthDay News) — Many pregnant patients do not receive guideline-based services and the number of prenatal visits does not explain this gap in provision of services, according to a study published online Oct. 3 in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology<\/em>.<\/p>\n Rebecca A. Gourevitch, from Harvard Medical School in Boston and colleagues measured the receipt of guideline-based prenatal care (eight components) among pregnant patients and described the association of guideline-based prenatal care with the number of prenatal visits and other patient characteristics. The analysis included 176,092 pregnancies between 2016 and 2019 identified using the OptumLabs Data Warehouse.<\/p>\n The researchers found that guideline-based care varied by service, from 51 percent receiving a timely urinalysis to 90 percent receiving an anatomy scan and 91 percent completing testing for sexually transmitted infections. On average, six of the eight guideline-based services were received by patients with at least four prenatal visits. Additional prenatal visits did not increase guideline-based care. Counties with high proportions of minority populations, lower education, and lower income had lower rates of tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis vaccination.<\/p>\n “Guideline-based prenatal care is not universal for pregnant patients, does not increase with the number of prenatal visits, and varies by patient- and area-level characteristics,” the authors write.<\/p>\n