Most women in Canada are not fortunate to have the proper resources or support to ease their pregnancy. During the perinatal period both the women and child carry significant risks before, during and after pregnancy. The Canada Prenatal Nutrition Program (CPNP) is a well-established program since 1994 that continues to provide long-term funds to numerous groups within Canada to help pregnant women overcome their current demographic conditions. This program endures to address the importance of at-risk pregnant women, their families and children with a vision to promote healthy pregnancy and birth outcomes. This program is targeted mainly towards women that are dealing with challenging life situation including teenage pregnancy, alcohol or substance
use, low-income, recent immigrants, domestic violence and etc. (CPNP, 2007). According to CPNP evaluation summary for 2015 there was 66% of low-income pregnant women, 27% single parents, and 41% of women experiencing food insecurity participants partaking from Canada (CPNP, 2015). This data clearly indicates that the participants lack resources due to overly expensive products that do not match their current income status. Moreover, the mentioned demographic factors have proven to be the source to why children are born unhealthy, underweight, or with birth defects, since mothers are not consuming enough nutrition during pregnancy. Over the years, CPNP continues to improve maternal and infant health by providing free and low-cost services, providing food programs to reduce risk of unhealthy birth weight, and reinforce community support for pregnant women. This program has revealed that their services has created an improved change to pregnant women and newborn’s health, where now women are delivering healthier child compared to women delivering in 2005 (CPNP, 2015). This programs is flexible as it focuses on all health topics that could rise during pregnancy, and essentially CPNP provides appropriate guidance on how to overcome those obstacles.
Mayo Clinic collaborative services educational publication. (2004). Mayo Clinic Guide to a Healthy Pregnancy. New York, NY, Harper Collins Publishers Inc.
Davis, PM, TL Carr, and CB La. "Needs assessment and current practice of alcohol risk assessment of pregnant women and women of childbearing age by primary health care professionals.."Canadian Journal of Clinical Pharmacology 15.2 (2008): 214-222.Pubmed.gov. Web. 25 Nov. 2013.
Two-thirds of infants die during the first month of life due to low birth weight (Lia-Hoagberg et al, 1990). One reason for this outcome is primarily due to difficulties in accessing prenatal care. Prenatal health care encompasses the health of women in both pre and post childbearing years and provides the support for a healthy lifestyle for the mother and fetus and/or infant. This form of care plays an important role in the prevention of poor birth outcomes, such as prematurity, low birth weight and infant mortality, where education, risk assessment, treatment of complications, and monitoring of fetus development are vital (McKenzie, Pinger,& Kotecki, 2012). Although every woman is recommended to receive prenatal health care, low-income and disadvantaged minority women do not seek care due to structural and individual barriers.
The disparities may be attributed to the amount of prenatal care that pregnant women of different ethnicities receive. In 1996, 81.8% of all women in the nation received prenatal care in the first trimester--the m...
The results of the study by Dale, Bakketeig, and Per Magnus (2016) regarding alcohol consumption among first-time mothers and its effects on preterm birth do not indicate a clear risk reduction for drinking during pregnancy. The surveys issued at gestational week 15 received a 94.9% response rate, with a sample size of 101,769 for the questionnaire and 108,327 from the Medical Birth Registry of Norway (MBRM). Collected data was narrowed to a total of 46,252 participants who met the criteria of primiparous women with singleton pregnancies who delivered between week 22 and 43 of gestation. In this study, the incidence of preterm birth was 5.9%, or 2,729 out of 46,252 births, with a median length of gestation of 40 weeks and mean of 39.47 weeks for both drinkers and nondrinkers during pregnancy (SD = 2.03). For prepregnacy drinkers, the mean pregnancy length was 39.48 weeks (SD = 2.02) (Dale et al., 2016).
Childbirth is biological, psychological, and natural activities by which the human species grow into its family cycle and childbirth also have a sexual tradition. Beyond the emotions and the various phases that it creates, childbirth has specific criteria to be met on both man and woman. Their union must be founded on the reciprocal love, the biological and psychological maturation, and a developed sense of responsibility. Because of this, a pregnancy occurred early in life is becoming a situation full of social, economical and psychological difficulties. The birth’s pain is weighted quickly on the young and premature couple. In the United States, teen’s pregnancies from ages 15 -19 remain one of the highest situations in the modern world. It has had little chance of success because many teens are still becoming parents and this problem is constantly increasing in the Latino/ Hispanic community. Immigration, peer pressures, dropout rate, cultural difference, and economic disadvantages are main reasons behind the majority teen’s pregnancies in this community. After I explain why it’s important to reduce teen’s pregnancy rates, I will suggest some challenging yet feasible solutions to break the cycle of unplanned pregnancies.
How the provision of information in the antenatal period can positively affect health and life style choices in the pregnant woman and her family.
Participating countries, including Canada, committed to “end preventable deaths of newborns and children under 5 years of age” by 2030, which implies guaranteeing adequate maternal and infant health care (Heymann, et al., 2017, p.23). The World Health Organization defines maternal health as “the health of women during pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period” (Khanlou, Haque, Skinner, Mantini, & Kurtz Landy, 2017, p.2). For the purpose of this paper, this definition will be expanded to encompass all aspects of lifestyle and care that can affect women’s and infant’s physical and psychological health in pregnancy, childbirth and the first six months of life. As previous research has shown, the issue of access to maternal health care is extremely relevant in Canada for multiple reasons. As a country with generous social support and universal health care, Canada highly values accessibility to health care as a social and human goal (Sutherns & Bourgeault, 2008, p.864). However, historically, public health policy in Canada has always reflected the values and priorities of the white middle-upper-class, with explicit references to race and class, which set the ground for inequalities that persist to this day (Warsh & Strong-Boag, p.287-288). As studies have shown
This paper describes the incidence of low birth weight in newborns in relation to the level of poverty among women on Prince Edward Island.
This underserved community has many problems such as preterm birth, teen pregnancy, low use of breastfeeding, and high rate of maternal mortality. Preterm birth is highly prevalent in the community, with 15.5% higher than the Healthy People goal of 11.4%. In addition, teen pregnancy is another concern in the community with being the highest in the Queens, New York City and New York State rate. Queens also has the lowest level of breastfeeding compare to other areas in the New York City. Maternal mortality is three times higher in African American in the NYC area than those of other races. This program focuses on reducing these health disparities and improves the health of those
Of the many social challenges we face globally today, there is one that is a much larger threat to the human population than others. That threat is the rate in which or population is increasing in all countries around the world, including Canada. Many people who live in the western and more developed countries of the world believe that this issue is isolated to the developing countries that are less educated in the use of birth control and contraceptives. Canada’s national population increases around 2% each year and around 4-5% a year in some of the Northern communities. The global world population is increasing at 1.06% each year, now, although that number does not sound incredibly high that 1.06
When becoming, pregnant there is a few steps that should be taken to ensure that you and the baby is healthy. Prenatal care is getting health care while pregnant. Prenatal care is divided in two sections (What is prenatal care? N.d. para. 1), the first section is early prenatal care and second section is regular prenatal care. Early prenatal care is if you think you are pregnant or know that you are pregnant you call the doctor and schedule a visit (What is prenatal care? N.d. para. 1). Regular Prenatal care is regularly scheduling check ups over the course of your pregnancy (What is prenatal care? N.d. para. 1). (Don’t miss any – they are very important appointments) In todays world, there are more women and teens becoming pregnant from the age range of 15 years old to 40 years old. Between this age range, these two have one thing in common that helps with having a healthy pregnancy and healthy baby is prenatal care. Prenatal care is essential for the health of the mother and the unborn child. Prenatal care is essential because it helps with decreasing multiple risks during pregnancy, because its not just for the mother and because there are 5 main benefits to prenatal care.
The target population for this assessment is adolescent mothers aged 15 to 19. For this essay, adolescent mothers are considered to be between the ages of 15 to 19, unless otherwise stated. There were 15,570 live births to adolescent mothers in Canada in 2008. In New Brunswick, there were 488 live births in 2008 (Statistics Canada, 2008). Less than 5% of adolescents who become pregnant opt for adoption in New Brunswick (L.Smith, personal communication, September 21, 2011). The Health Indicators report showed that 28% of New Brunswick teenage pregnancies occurred in the Saint John area in 2009 (Office of the Chief Medical Officer of Health{OCMOH}, 2011). The report also identified the teenage fertility rate in New Brunswick. This rate refers to the number of live births that occur to females aged 15 to 19 per 1,000. In Saint John, the fertility rate for adolescents is 43.7. This number is significantly higher than the national teenage fertility rate of 14 and the provincial fertility rate of 20 (OCMOH). Although Canada’s national fertility rate is less than half of the United States of America’s rate of 41, it is still higher than most European countries including France, which has a rate of eight, and the Netherlands’s rate of four (OCMOH). These statistics show a significant number of adolescent mothers in Saint John, New Brunswick and Canada, proving the need for health care interventions for this target population.
March Dimes Foundation: Pregnancy and Newborn Health Education Center. Retrieved from http://www.marchofdimes.com/materials/teenage-pregnancy.pdf
Swierzewki, Stanley J.III MD. "Teen Pregnancy & Health Risks to the Baby." Teen Pregnancy (2000). Web. 23 September 2013. .