Abstract:
Background: Perinatal deaths are deaths after seven completed months of gestation plus early neonatal
death. It has a much higher burden on least developed and developing countries than the developed
world. It is one of the indicators used to show the quality and coverage of ante natal and perinatal
services provided. In our country there has been a few researches done in different areas in a different
time. Thus, this study aims to provide information on the magnitude of perinatal mortality and factors
associated with it in the study area during the study period.
Methods: Facility based cross-sectional study was conducted from January 2017 to July 2017, by
reviewing all the available data; interview of relevant health staff, clients and families of all births
attended that perinatal deaths occurred at Nekemte Referral Hospital. Data were collected by trained
data collectors using structured questionnaire and the data was cleaned, entered, processed and analyzed
using SPSS version 22 Statistical test for significance; Bivariate and multivariable logistic regression
were used to identify the candidate and predictor variables respectively. Statistically significance was
declared at p <0.05.
Result: The hospital perinatal mortality was revealed to be 107 deaths per 1000 live births (136 still
births and 92 early neonatal deaths found to be still births rate and early neonatal deaths rate of 64 and
43 per 1000 live births respectively). The most obstetric risk factors to perinatal death were identified to
be mechanical factors 92 (40.4%), followed by hypertensive disorder of pregnancy 90 (39.5%),
hemorrhage 43 (18.9%), premature rupture of membrane 41 (18%), preterm labor 13 (5.7%) and
perinatal asphyxia 95 (41.7%), prematurity 39 (21%) and neonatal sepsis 33 (14.5%) were the three
leading causes of early neonatal death.
Residence, educational status, place and number of ANC follow up, and perinatal asphyxia were
significantly associated with perinatal mortality.
Conclusion and recommendations: Residence, level of education, place and low number of ANC and
perinatal asphyxia were encountered risk factors identified to be significantly associated with perinatal
mortality. Deaths due to these factors may be prevented by improving early referral systems from primary
health care units to higher settings, improving the quality and coverage of antenatal and peripartal
obstetric care.
