[Perinatal and neonatal mortality at the Clinicas de Porto Alegre Hospital, Brazil].
OBJECTIVE
Epidemiological analysis of neonatal and perinatal mortality of 20,280 newborns alive with 500g or more and 374 stillbirths occurred at the Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre from 1984 to 1990.


OBJECTIVE
To compare two periods: A (1984-1987) with B (1988-1990), establishing a relationship between the changes occurred in the causes and the rate of mortality.


METHODS
The retrospective study was done with the records of promptuaries of obstetrical and neonatal centers, and review of flow-sheets of the deaths and autopsies.


RESULTS
Between 1984 to 1990, 20,280 newborns alive with 500g or more, 374 stillbirths at perinatal unit of Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre were born. 258 deaths occurred, the neonatal mortality rate was 12.7 per thousand. The stillbirth rate was 18.4 per thousand. The perinatal mortality rate was 28.4 per thousand. The incidence of low birth weight (< 2,500g) was 11.2% and very low birth weight (< 1,500 g) was 1.8%, the former group had an increase incidence between 1984-1988 (A) from 1.5% to 2.2% (B). The causes of deaths were distributed as follow: a) intrauterine infections (22.4%); b) hyaline membrane disease (20.1%); c) congenital malformation (18.2%); d) asphyxia (15.5%); e) postnatal infections (9.7%). The causes of stillbirth were: a) perinatal asphyxia (38.7%); b) intrauterine infections (9%); toxemia (8.2%); d) malformation (7.4%). The period B showed changes with an increase of postnatal infections odds ration (OR) 7 (1.9-30.6) and congenital malformations OR 1.6 (0.8-3.2). It did not occurred a decrease in mortality rate for prematures below 1,500g OR 90 (61-118) in A to 54 (37-68) in B.


CONCLUSIONS
The advantages in technology and human capacity were not sufficient to reduce significantly the rate of neonatal mortality.
Miura
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E
Unidade de Neonatologia do Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre, Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre.
Failace
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LH
Fiori
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D001724:Birth Weight; D005260:Female; D005313:Fetal Death / Q000453:epidemiology*; D017052:Hospital Mortality; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007232:Infant, Newborn, Diseases / Q000401:mortality*; D011247:Pregnancy; D012189:Retrospective Studies