Background: It is believed that giving birth in an upright position is beneficial for both mother and the infant for several physiologic reasons. An upright positioning helps the uterus to contract more strongly and efficiently, the baby gets in a better position and thus can pass through the pelvis faster. Upright and lateral positions enables flexibility in the pelvis and facilitates the extension of the outlet. Before implementing a change in birthing positions in our clinics we need to review evidences available and context valid related to duration of second stage of labor and birthing positions. Therefore this review aimed to examine the effect of maternal flexible sacrum birth position on duration of second stage of labor.Method: The research searched articles using bibliographical Databases: Medline/PUBMED, SCOPUS, Google scholar and Google. All study designs were considered while investigating the impact of maternal flexible sacrum birthing positioning in relation duration of second stage of labor. Studies including laboring mothers with normal labor and delivery. A total of 1985 women were included in the reviewed studies. We included both qualitative and quantitative analysis.Results: We identified 1680 potential citations, of which 8 articles assessed the effect of maternal upright birth positioning on the reduction during the duration of second stage of labor. Two studies were excluded because of incomplete reports for meta analysis. The result suggested a reduction in duration of second stage of labor among women in a flexible sacrum birthing position, with a mean duration from 3.2–34.8. The pooled weighted mean difference with random effect model was 21.118(CI: 11.839–30.396) minutes, with the same significant heterogeneity between the studies (I² = 96.8%,p < 000).Conclusion: The second stage duration was reduced in cases of a flexible sacrum birthing position. Even though the reduction in duration varies across studies with considerable heterogeneity, laboring women should be encouraged to choose her comfortable birth position. Researchers who aim to compare different birthing positions should consider study designs which enable women to choose birthing position.Prospero registration number: [CRD42019120618]

Intimate partner physical violence is a common global phenomenon. About 30.00% and 38.83% of women in the world and in sub-Saharan Africa experienced physical violence by their partner respectively in 2013. Though intimate partner violence has serious adverse health consequences, there is limited information about partner violence during pregnancy in Ethiopia. Therefore, the aim of this study was to assess the prevalnce of physical intimate partner violence during pregnancy and associated factors among women attending antenatal care in Shire Endaselassie town, Tigray, northen Ethiopia A facility based cross-sectional study was conducted from May 3 to July 6, 2015. Four hundred and twenty-two pregnant women attending three public health facilities were included using systematic sampling technique. In addition, twenty-two purposely selected key informants were interviewed. The data collectors and supervisors were trained on all data collection processes. Data were entered to Epi-Info version 7.1.2.00 and exported to SPSS version 20.00. Logistic regression was used to identify factors associated with intimate partner physical violence. Statistical significance was declared at p < 0.05. Qualitative data were categorized into themes and triangulated with the quantitative results. The prevalence of intimate partner physical violence in pregnancy was 20.6% (CI = 16.70, 24.90). Age at first marriage greater than or equal to 17 years (AOR = 4.42, CI = 2.07, 9.42), women with no formal education (AOR = 2.78 CI = 1.10, 7.08), rural dwellers (AOR = 2.63 CI = 1.24, 5.58), intimate partners with no formal education (AOR = 2.78 CI = 1.10, 7.08) and intimate partner alcohol consumption (AOR = 3.8 CI = 1.85, 7.82) were factors associated with intimate partner physical violence towards pregnant women. Nearly one fifth of women surveyed experienced intimate partner physical violence during pregnancy. Early marriage, rural dwelling, intimate partner alcohol consumption, and educational status were associated with intimate partner physical violence during pregnancy. Urgent attention to women’s rights and health is essential at all levels to alleviate the problem and its risk factors in Tigray regional state of Ethiopia.

This study was aimed to assess perinatal outcomes of severe preeclampsia/eclampsia and associated factors among mothers admitted in Amhara Region referral hospitals, North West Ethiopia, 2018. This study revealed that the overall prevalence of unfavorable perinatal outcome from the severe preeclamptic/eclamptic mothers was 46.5%. It shows that the finding of unfavorable perinatal outcome was high which needs an obligation to put our recommendation as improvement of health care set ups for preventions as well as interventions of such problems. Variables which were positively associated with unfavorable perinatal outcomes were: maternal educational status (AOR = 6.6, 95% CI 1.32, 10.03), parity (AOR = 8.3, 95% CI 6.27, 27.02), gestational age in weeks (AOR = 9.6, 95% CI 2, 18.65) and time of drug given for the mother (AOR = 3.8, 95% CI 1.81, 8.07).

This study was aimed to assess appropriate complementary feeding practice and associated factors among mothers having children aged 6–24 months in Debre Tabor Hospital, North West Ethiopia, 2016. In this study, 37.2% of mothers had appropriate complementary feeding practice. Mothers’ level of education above grade 12 (AOR = 2.96, CI 1.2–7.62), husbands’ occupation (AOR = 4.01, CI 1.3–12.44), mothers ‘having exclusive breast feeding practice (AOR = 6.12, CI 3.04–12.3), health education about exclusive breast feeding during antenatal care visit (AOR = 5.59, CI 1.24–25.17) and advice on appropriate complementary feeding practice during antenatal care visit (AOR = 6.34, CI 1.5–26.91), and mothers who have got under 5 unit service due to infant and young children illness (AOR = 0.44, CI 0.22–0.89) were statistically significant variables for appropriate complementary feeding practice.

Background: Globally, attention to maternal health and safe motherhood has grown significantly to reduce maternal deaths which estimated to 289,000 in 2013. The sub-Saharan Africa countries account for 62% (179,000) of maternal deaths including Ethiopia. Little is known about knowledge of danger signs during pregnancy and its associated factors. Objective: This study aimed to assess the knowledge about danger signs of pregnancy and associated factors among pregnant women in Debra Birhan town, public health institutions, central Ethiopia, 2014. Methods: Institutional based cross sectional study was conducted in 2014, on the 355 pregnant women. Pre-tested and structured questionnaire was used to collect data. Data were entered to EpiInfo version 3.5.1 statistical package and exported to SPSS version 20.0 for further analysis. Logistic regression analyses were used to see the association of different variables. Results: 355 pregnant women participated in the study making a response rate of 100%. In this study, 137(38.6%) of the respondents were knowledgeable about danger signs during pregnancy. Being urban residence (AOR= 4.94, 95% CI: 2.97-8.21), educational level of grade 9-10 (AOR= 8.53, 95% CI: 2.47-29.48) and having attended diploma and above (AOR= 15.40; 95% CI: 3.74-63.40), having previous antenatal care follow up (AOR= 2.03, 95% CI: 1.07-3.86) were factors found to be significantly associated with knowledge of danger signs during pregnancy. Conclusion: This study revealed that the knowledge level of pregnant women about danger signs of pregnancy was not adequate. Being urban resident, educational level of grade 9-10, having attended diploma and above and having previous antenatal care follow up were significantly associated with knowledge about danger signs during pregnancy. Ministry of health should be strengthening reproductive health services in rural areas to get quality antenatal care follow up by designing an appropriate strategies including provision of targeted information, education and communication.

Restricting women giving birth in health care facilities from choosing the most comfortable position during labor and birth is a global problem. This study was aimed to examine the effect of flexible sacrum birth positions on maternal and neonatal outcomes in public health facilities in Ethiopia’s Amhara Region. A non-equivalent control group post-test-only design was employed at public health facilities from August to November 2019. A total of 1048 participants were enrolled and assigned to intervention or control groups based on their choice of birth position. Participants who preferred the flexible sacrum birth position received the intervention, while participants who preferred the supine birth position were placed in the control group. Data were collected using observational follow-up from admission to immediate postpartum period. Log binomial logistic regression considering as treated analysis was used. Of the total participants, 970 women gave birth vaginally, of whom 378 were from the intervention group, and 592 were from the control group. The intervention decreased the chance of perineal tear and poor Apgar score by 43 and 39%, respectively. The flexible sacrum position reduced the duration of the second stage of labor by a mean difference of 26 min. Maternal and newborn outcomes were better in the flexible sacrum position.