Detection of low birth-weight new born babies by anthropometric measurements in Bangladesh

Birthweight is an important indicator of child survival. Appropriate and timely care of a newborn specially if he is born with low birthweight is important but this is difficult in developing countries since most of the deliveries are conducted at home where adequate facilities to weigh a new born does not exist. This study was conducted to find out a surrogate which could efficiently be used for detecting low birthweight babies at birth when no weighing machine is around. In this study 41% of the newborn babies were found to weigh less than 2,500 gm at birth. Out of this about 52% were females. The mean chest, thigh and mid-arm circumference at birth for males were 30.89 cm, 15.06 cm and 9.27 cm respectively with standard deviations of 1.83 cm, 1.30 cm and 1.04 cm. Corresponding figures for female babies were 30.69 cm, 15.14 cm and 9.25 cm respectively with standard deviations of 2.08 cm, 1.70 cm and 1.16 cm. Correlation co-efficient between normal birthweight and the chest, thigh and mid-arm circumference were 0.867, 0.845 and 0.842 respectively. A liner regression analysis showed that a chest circumference of 30.14 cm, a thigh circumference of 14.56 cm and a mid-arm circumference of 8.90 cm corresponded well with a birthweight of 2,500 gm. On this basis sensitivity, specificity and predictive values of the chest circumference was better than the other two measurements. However, the mid-arm circumference was observed to be more reliable than the other two measurements for detecting birthweight less than 2,000 gm. A home made measuring tape has been devised on this basis to detect brithweights with cut-off values for 2,500 gm, 2,000 gm to 2,500 gm and 2,000 gm in different shades of colour for illiterate birth attendants.