Epidemiological profile of puerperal women in an obstetric inpatient unit at a teaching hospital in southern Brazil

Abstract

Introduction: The aim of this research is to identify the epidemiological profile of puerperal women treated in an obstetric inpatient unit of a tertiary teaching hospital in southern Brazil. Methods: This is a cross-sectional, exploratory-descriptive study with a quantitative approach. It was carried out with puerperal women admitted to an obstetric inpatient unit between from June 1st, 2022 to June 1st 2023. For the description of the analyses, continuous variables were described as mean (±sd) or median [p25 - p75], depending on their normality assessed by the Shapiro-Wilk test, and categorical variables were described as absolute and relative frequencies. Results: They discovered that among the 486 puerperal women analysed, the majority were between 25 and 34 years old, 73.5% said they were white, 16.7% were married, 43.2% had completed high school and 38.7 % were obese, among other aspects regarding obstetric and neonatal issues. With regard to drug use, 15.2% were using some kind of substance, of which 68.9% used some kind of licit substance, while 31% used some illicit substance. The substances that most stood out in the study were tobacco (71.6%), alcohol (27.0%), cannabis (25.6%), cocaine (9.4%) and crack (2.7%). Conclusions: Knowing and analysing this data provides comprehensive and effective obstetric care, contributing to public policy strategies and better perinatal outcomes involving women’s health.