Using data from 60 round of the National Sample Survey, this study attempts to measure the incidence and intensity of “catastrophic” maternal health care expenditure and examines its socio-economic correlates in urban and rural areas separately. Additionally, it measures the effect of maternal health care expenditure on poverty incidence and examines the factors associated with such impoverishm...

OBJECTIVE To assess the associations of social determinants on cardiovascular health among White and Black residing in Stroke Belt (urban) and Stroke Buckle (rural) regions of the South. DESIGN A cross-sectional observational analysis based on a random digit-dial telephone survey of a representative sample of White and Black adults residing in urban and rural Georgia conducted from 2004-2005....

OBJECTIVE To characterise plasma and red-blood-cell (RBC) folate status among pregnant women in an area with an extremely high prevalence of neural tube defects, and to compare them with those of women from a low prevalence area. DESIGN A cross-sectional survey conducted in 2003. SETTING One county and one city from each of the high prevalence area and the low prevalence area in China. SU...

OBJECTIVE This study aimed to examine regional urban-rural differences in mortality from ischaemic heart disease, including sudden death of unknown cause (IHD/SUD) in Norway from 1966-89, for men and women aged 30-69 years. DESIGN Analysis was based on vital statistics. Regional mortality rates were obtained by aggregating the 443 municipalities in Norway into urban, rural, and intermediate m...

BACKGROUND Monitoring of iodine nutrition depends chiefly on the urinary iodine concentration in representative samples from the population. International groups have recommended school-age children as a convenient group for surveys, because of their accessibility and young age, but the relevance of this group to others, especially pregnant women, is not well established. OBJECTIVE The purpos...

BACKGROUND Guatemala has experienced a substantial increase in overweight and obesity in recent years, yet physical activity patterns and consequent energy expenditure are largely unexplored in this population. METHODS To describe overall physical activity levels (PAL) and activities contributing to daily energy expenditure, we analyzed time spent in daily activities as reported by 985 women ...

BACKGROUND Globally, about 350.000 women die every year from pregnancy related causes and more than half of these deaths occur in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Approximately 12% of the maternal deaths are associated with hypertensive disorders in pregnancy such as pregnancy induced hypertension (PIH). However, very little is known about PIH and associated determinants in many SSA countries such as ...

In a house-to-house study of 994 urban Zulus the prevalence of hypertension according to WHO criteria was 25% (23% men, 27% women). In a rural Zulu study of 987 the prevalence age corrected to the urban distribution was 9.4% (8.7% men, 10% women). Thus there was a pronounced difference between the prevalence of hypertension in the urban and rural Zulu (p less than 0.0005). There was an earlier ...

OBJECTIVE To investigate and compare determinates for delayed first presentation to antenatal care (ANC) services. METHODS A cross-sectional study was conducted amongst pregnant women attending their first ANC visit in rural Capricorn District and peri-urban Tlokwe sub-district communities in South Africa. Data collection included questionnaires and medical record abstraction. Bivariate and m...

OBJECTIVES To estimate race/ethnicity-specific prevalence of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) in pregnant urban women and to evaluate factors associated with maternal HBsAg testing. METHODS A multicenter, retrospective chart review was conducted of a racially/ethnically stratified random sample of maternal/infant charts of 10 523 women who gave birth to live infants during 1990-1993 in 4 u...