Abstract:
Background: Every year, an estimated 15 million babies are born preterm, and this number is
rising. The geographical distribution and other factors associated with preterm birth vary
across different cultures and socioeconomic statuses within a society. However, there is little
data on the extent of preterm birth in the study area.
Objectives: To assess the magnitude of preterm birth and associated factors among mother
who gave birth in the last 12 months of west Shoa zone hospitals, Oromia, Ethiopia, 2022.
Methods: A hospital based retrospective cross-sectional study was conducted on 325 among
mother who gave birth in the last 12 months of West Shoa Zone hospitals from semptember20
to October 20/2022. A systematic random sampling technique was used to select participants.
The data was collected by reviewing their charts using a structured and pretested question naire. The collected data were daily checked for completeness and consistency, and they were
entered into Epidata version 3.1 and exported to SPSS version 26 for analysis. Both descrip tive, binary logistic regressions and multivariable logistic regression analysis was carried out
for data analysis. To measure the strength of the association between dependent and independ ent variables, crude and adjusted odds ratios with 95% confidence interval were calculated.
The Hosmer-Lemeshow test yielded a p-value greater than 0.05, indicating for model fitness
and there were no multicollinearity among explanatory variables. Finally, variables that
showed a p value of <0.05 were considered statistically significant. The findings were dis played using text, tables, and graphs.
Result: The study showed that the magnitude of preterm birth was 24.3% (95%CI: 21.0, 29.8).
Women who didn’t attend ANC (AOR = 2.4, 95% CI: 1.4, 5.4), had medical problems (AOR
= 2.8, 95% CI: 1.2, 6.4), had multiple pregnancies (AOR = 2.41, 95% CI: 1.2, 5.3), were living
in rural areas (AOR = 3.0, 95% CI: 1.4, 6.8), and induced labor (AOR = 3.7, 95% CI: 1.5, 9.1)
had higher odds of preterm birth compared to their counterparts.
Conclusion and recommendation: Preterm birth is high in West Shoa Zone hospitals. Pre term birth was found to be statistically associated with not attending antenatal care, having
multiple pregnancies, having a chronic medical illness, living in rural areas, and having in duced labor. As a result, efforts must be made to reduce the magnitude of pret
