March 2019 Euro-Peristat Newsletter

On November 26, 2018, the Euro-Peristat network issued a new European Perinatal Health Report entitled "Core indicators of the health and care of pregnant women and babies in Europe in 2015". This report presents indicators on five million births in 2015 using data from public national statistical systems in the EU member states and Iceland, Norway and Switzerland. International and national press releases for the report can also be found on our website.  
 
To provide more context for the report, we have started a new series in our newsletter (below), where we will feature short commentaries from our members about why this report is important in their countries. We start with perspectives from Croatia, Luxembourg and Portugal: 

Urelija Rodin, Department for Vulnerable Groups Health Care, Croatian National Institute of Public Health, and Boris Filipovic-Grcic, School of Medicine University of Zagreb, Croatia

Guy Weber, Ministry of Health, Directorate of Health, Epidemiology and Statistics Unit, and Aline Lecomte, Luxembourg Institute of Health, Department of Population Health, Luxembourg
 

Henrique Barros, University of Porto Medical School, Department of Public Health, Forensic Sciences and Medical Education, and Diana Seabra, Public Health Institute Porto University, Portugal

Quantifying the burden of stillbirths before 28 weeks of completed gestational age in high-income countries, in The Lancet.

International comparisons of stillbirth allow assessment of variations in clinical practice to reduce mortality. Currently, such comparisons include only stillbirths from 28 or more completed weeks of gestational age, which underestimates the true burden of stillbirth. With increased registration of early stillbirths in high-income countries, we assessed the reliability of including stillbirths before 28 completed weeks in such comparisons. Read more

Epidemiology of late preterm and early term births - An international perspective, in Seminars Fetal Neonatal Med.

Late preterm (34-36 weeks of gestational age (GA)), and early term (37-38 weeks GA) birth rates among singleton live births vary from 3% to 6% and from 15% to 31%, respectively, in Europe. Birth before 39 weeks GA is associated with adverse child health outcomes across a wide range of settings. International rate variations suggest that reductions in early delivery are achievable; implementation of best practice guidelines for obstetrical interventions and public health policies targeting population risk factors could contribute to prevention of both late preterm and early term births. Read more

The European Standards of Care for Newborn Health, developed together with about 220 experts from more than 20 countries, were officially published on 28 November 2018 and are freely available on the internet. The project is coordinated by the parent organisation European Foundation for the Care of Newborn Infants (EFCNI) that represents the interests of newborn infants, parents, and families.The standards cover the whole patient journey of babies born preterm or with other health problems, starting with birth and transfer of the mother or the baby to the time in the NICU (medical care, care procedures) and up until school age (follow-up). Two standards focus especially on data collection and documentation. EFCNI’s philosophy is that high quality data to describe the current situation and to measure the impact of health policies are essential for improving maternal and newborn health.