‘Proper diet, exercise & rest prevent caesarean deliveries’

KABUL (Pajhwok): More than one million women give birth to children in hospitals nationwide annually, with seven percent mothers undergoing caesarean section procedure, Public Health Ministry officials said on Saturday.

Some maternity physicians advise that in order to have a normal delivery, mothers need proper diet, exercise and should drink up to 25 glasses of liquids every day and rest during pregnancy.

Malalai Maternity Hospital director Dr. Malalai Rahim Faizi told Pajhwok Afghan News that 3,500 women delivered babies through surgical procedure during the first six months of this year while 7,308 babies were naturally conceived during the period.

“On a daily basis up to 80 babies are delivered normally while up to 30 women undergo surgeries”.

Pointing to the higher number of caesarean section births in the hospital, she said such deliveries kept the doctors busy and led to shortage of beds,  but they saved the lives of mothers and babies.

“Diabetes, high blood pressure, blood loss during the last trimester of pregnancy, twins or triplets in one abdomen or decrease of abdomen liquids are main causes of C-section deliveries”, she said.

Another maternity specialist Dr. Sonita Bahram at Shifajo Hospital advised expecting women to regularly visit maternity doctors on monthly basis.

She said pregnant women in additional to their daily activities and they should walk for two hours every day.

She said having a proper diet regime, drinking 25 glasses of liquids during the day, doing exercise, rest and lack of anxiety were impressive habits for having a normal delivery.

She clarified: “No prediction can be made about the delivery, even if a pregnant woman has no problems, she may also need C-section or she may deliver her baby during the operation normally.”

However another maternity doctress at KIM hospital Wahid Muhmand said: “C-section cases cannot be predicted and it cannot be prevented and it is an emergency case, whenever a normal delivery process faces a problem, so the baby is delivered through C-section surgery.”

She also said healthy diet, enough liquids, controlling blood pressure and diabetes and observing interval between births were effective in preventing C-section childbirths.

An official at MoPH pregnancy health department Dr. Nafisa Sahak said: “The rate of C-section operations in Afghanistan is higher compared to other countries.”

While not providing exact figures for C-section deliveries in the country, she said in every 100 births, 93 percent babies were delivered through normal procedure.

She said: “We cannot decrease the number of births or the number of C-section operations because every 10 or 15 percent of babies are delivered through operation in other countries.”

MoPH has launched a program for creating awareness among mothers in health centers to prevent this problem, Sahak explained.

Dr. Sahak urged mothers to visit physicians during pregnancy on regular basis.

MoPH’s spokesman Dr. Sharafat Zaman told Pajhwok Afghan News the country’s hospitals registered 1.1 million births during the past one year.

aw/ma