Provider-initiated delivery, late preterm birth and perinatal mortality: A secondary analysis of the WHO multicountry survey on maternal and newborn health

Abstract

Introduction In high-income countries, a reduced clinical threshold for obstetric interventions such as labour induction (LI) and prelabour caesarean delivery (PLCD) has played a substantial role in increasing rates of late preterm births. However, the association between provider-initiated delivery and perinatal outcomes have not been studied in a multicountry setting including low-income and middle-income countries. Methods 286 hospitals in 29 countries participated in the WHO Multi-Country Survey on Maternal and Newborn Health and yielded 2 52 198 singleton births of at least 34 weeks in 2010–2011. We used an ecological analysis based on generalised estimating equations under multilevel l..