ABSTRACT

How maternal age, height, weight and body mass index affect primary caesarean section
rate was evaluated. This is a comparative descriptive study, carried out in the department
of obstetrics and gynaecology , Federal Medical centre, Owerri Imo state. The study
subjects were recruited using the systematic random sampling technique. The results
showed that the mean age of women who had vaginal delivery was marginally higher than
that of those who had caesarean delivery : 29.30yrs +/- 4.3SD (vaginal) vs 28.83yrs+/-
4.4SD for caesarean section group. The height of women who had normal delivery ranged
from 1.50m to 1.83m with a mean height of 1.65 +/- 0.059SD whereas the height of women
who underwent caesarean delivery ranged from 1.45m to 1.77m with a mean of 1.63 +/- 0.
069SD. This was slightly lower than the mean height for vaginal delivery above. The
weights of the women who had vaginal delivery ranged from 55 to 130kg with a mean of
81.88kg +/ – 12.53SD,whereas the weight of the women that had caesarean delivery ranged
from 53.00 to 148.00kg with a mean of 85.62kg +/ – 20.29SD, which was reasonably higher
than the mean weight for vaginal delivery above. On crosstabulation of the women’s weight
with their modes of delivery, 78.6% (114) of the women whose weight was less than 90kg
delivered normally and only 21.4% (31) had caesarean delivery. The Body Mass Index (BMI)
of the entire women recruited into the study ranged from 19.38 to 49.45kg/m2 with a mean
of 30.66kg/m2 +/- 4.76 SD. The BMI of the women who had vaginal delivery ranged from
19.38 to 43.16kg/m2 with a mean of 30.21kg/m2
+/ – 4.09 SD. while the BMI of the
caesarean section group ranged from 21.34 to 49.45kg/m2 with a mean of 32.10kg/m2 +/ –
6.26 SD. In conclusion, Maternal height, BMI, age and socio – economic status were not
significantly associated with a risk of primary caesarean delivery. There is need for
further studies to evaluate the determinants of primary caesarean section in a larger
sample size.
Keywords Maternal age, height, weight, body mass index and primary caesarean.