Asian American and Pacific Islander
Women's Health
Homepage> Asian Women's Health Topics > Reproduction and Maternal Health > Prenatal Care, Labor, and Delivery
Reproduction and Maternal Health
Prenatal Care, Labor, and Delivery
What is it?
Why is it important?
Resources
References
What Is It?
Prenatal care is the health care for pregnant women to ensure healthy pregnancies, delivery, and babies. In the United States , prenatal care typically is prenatal care visits to the physician or midwife, usually starting in the first trimester (0 – 13 weeks). Pregnant women continue to see a health care provider throughout her pregnancy.
Western labor and delivery usually take place in a birthing center or hospital. As part of hospital care, monitors that detect the fetus's heart rate and uterine contractions are placed on the mom. These help health care providers to make sure that labor is going well and that the baby is doing well too. Periodically, the midwife or physician may do vaginal examinations to determine if the woman is progressing in labor.
Why Is It Important?
Prenatal care has many components to keep the mother and baby healthy. It consists of doing blood tests, ultrasounds to look at the baby, and making sure the mother and baby are growing and staying healthy. Pelvic and vaginal examinations may also be done. These tests and procedures can let the physician and mom know early on if there are other health problems that may arise during pregnancy that might affect the pregnancy. This is also a time for the pregnant woman to ask her midwife or physician questions about the pregnancy, labor, and delivery.
Asian women do not always seek prenatal care, and this is frequently dependent upon how long they have lived in the United States. Many Asian immigrant women do not have a complete understanding of Western pregnancy, labor, and delivery as traditional birthing process has remained at home. They may also rely on more traditional birthing advisors, such as female family members. Korean and Vietnamese women were more likely to not seek prenatal care. Asian women who were single mothers or young mothers, had low educational level, or had a high number of births for their age were at the highest risk for not having prenatal care. The Hmong also do not seek prenatal care or seek care in late pregnancy. They often list language barriers and vaginal examinations as reasons for not getting prenatal care. Other barriers include financial reasons and lack of health insurance.
Resources
• Asian American Health
http://asianamericanhealth.nlm.nih.gov/intro.html• National Asian Women's Health Organization
http://www.nawho.org• Planned Parenthood - Prenatal Care, Pregnancy, and Vaginal Examination
http://www.plannedparenthood.com/pp2/portal/files/portal/medicalinfo/pregnancy/pub-pregnancy-prenatal.xml
http://www.plannedparenthood.com/pp2/portal/files/portal/medicalinfo/pregnancy/pub-pregnancy-planning.xml
http://www.plannedparenthood.com/pp2/portal/files/portal/medicalinfo/femalesexualhealth
/pub-gynecological-exam.xml• The South Asian Women's NETwork
http://www.sawnet.org/
References
• Levine, MA, Anderson, L, & McCullough, N. (2004). Hmong birthing: Bridging the cultural gap in a rural community in Northern California. Lifelines, 8 (2), 147 – 149
• Spring, MA, Ross, PJ, Etkin, NL, & Deinard, AS. (1995). Sociocultural factors in the use of prenatal care by Hmong women, Minneapolis. American Journal of Public Health , 85 (7), 1015 – 1018
• Yu, SM, Alexander, GR, Schwalberg, R, & Kogan, MD. (2001). Prenatal care use among selected Asian American groups. American Journal of Public Health, 91 (11), 1865 – 1868