January 2016 Vol. 4 No.1

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Original Research Article

Prevalence and Associated Factors of Urinary Tract Infections among Pregnant Mothers Attending Antenatal Medical Care Service in Yabello Primary Hospital, Borena Zone, Southern Ethiopia

Fatuma Ahmed¹, Eshetu Molla¹ and Feleke Eriso^2*

¹Department of Public Health, College of Health Sciences and Medicine, Dilla University, PO Box 419, Dilla, Ethiopia./
Department of Biomedical Sciences, College of Health Sciences and Medicine, Dilla University, PO Box 419, Dilla, Ethiopia.

²Department of Biology, College of Natural and Computational Sciences, Dilla University, Dilla, Ethiopia.

*Corresponding Author’s E-mail: feleke.eriso@yahoo.com
Tel: +251-916514682

Accepted January 17, 2016

Abstract

Urinary Tract Infections (UTI) during pregnancy is a prevalent disease condition which is associated with maternal complications and adverse obstetric outcomes like prematurity, low birth weight and higher fetal mortality rate. The key objective of this study was to assess the prevalence and associated factors of urinary tract infections in pregnant women visiting antenatal medical care service in Yabello Primary Hospital. A cross-sectional study design was conducted on all pregnant mothers attending antenatal medical care service in Yabello Primary Hospital and agreed to be enrolled in the study from 1 Sep. – 30 Dec. 2014/informal intermittently up to the beginning of 2016. A total of 280 mothers were enrolled in the study by convenient sampling technique. Each respondent was interviewed with pre-tested questionnaires and urine samples of each mother were checked for presence of urinary tract infections by laboratory test. All pregnant women who were on antibiotics treatment two weeks prior to hospital visit and those who did not agree to be enrolled were excluded from the study. The collected data were processed and analyzed using SPSS version 20. Microbial studies have found that experienced workers can achieve better diagnostic precision for UTI with urine microscopy than with urine culture. So urine microscopy was applied for effective detecting of the microbes identified and supplemented by dip sticks. Some samples were also counterchecked with the method of urine culture involving Gram-Stain, but no difference in accuracy. A total of 280 pregnant mothers were involved in the study and 31 (11.1%) of them had urinary tract infections. Escherichia coli (45.2%) was the commonest isolated bacterial pathogen. The highest age specific prevalence of urinary tract infection was seen in age group 30-34(19.4%) and the lowest was seen in age group 25-29 (10.0%) and none in those age groups greater than 45 years old (0.0%). There was no significant association between parity and presence of UTI, as well as between maternal age and prevalence of UTI but there was significant association between gestational age and presence of UTI. This study showed that 11.1% of pregnant women had UTI. Escherichia coli was the predominant isolate causing urinary tract infection in pregnant mothers. The comparison of the number of occurrence of pregnant women having UTI with the stages of trimester indicated that the pregnant women in the third trimester were very likely to be positive for UTI.

Key words: Escherichia coli, pregnant women, prevalence, urinary tract infections