Iron, vitamin D and multivitamin use and associated factors of pregnant women

Abstract

Anemia affects approximately 40% of pregnant women worldwide and half of anemia cases are associated with iron deficiency. [2,3] Iron deficiency causes fetal outcomes such as preterm labor, neonatal mortality and infection. [4] World Health Organization (WHO) recommends daily or intermittent use of iron prophylactically depending on the prevalence of anemia in the countries. [1,2] Since 2005, prophylactic iron supplementation has been recommended to all pregnant women including the postpartum period (40-60 mg/day), and treatment dose (100-120 mg/day) is given there is a presence of anemia in Turkey. [5] Evidently, however, the expected targets have not been achieved with this practice. The prevalence of anemia in the 1990s was 39.6% in Turkey, however the prevalence was 33.3% in 2000. [6] In addition, the prevalence of anemia was 32.4% in 2005, when iron supplementation started during pregnancy, and was 34.4% in 2016. [6] Objectives: The aim of this study is to determine the frequency of iron, vitamin D and multivitamin supplement usage among pregnant women and the factors associated with it.Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted between March 15, 2018 and September 30, 2018 among a total of 400 pregnant women by the questionnaire form consisted of 27 questions. Hemoglobin values below 11g/dl were considered as anemia. Results:The mean age of the pregnant women was 28.2±5.2 years, and 170 (42.5%) of them had anemia. Among the pregnant women, 302 (75.5%) had been recommended to use iron, 208 (52.0%) had been recommended to use Vit D and 308 (77.0%) had been recommended to use multivitamin. Among the pregnant women 250 (62.5%) of them use iron, 146 (36.5%) of them use vitamin D and 262 (65.5%) of them use multivitamin. Conclusion:Although programs for iron and vitamin D have been carried out for many years, the use of vitamin D and iron in pregnant women were not at the desired level. Although there is not a routine recommendation, multivitamin use during pregnancy was found to be quite common.