Prevalencia de partos en la adolescencia y factores asociados en el Hospital Universitario de Santander, Bucaramanga (Colombia) 2006. Estudio de corte transversal

Objective: adolescent pregnancy refers to gestation occurring between age 10 and 19; this has become a public health problem in Colombia. This study sought to determine the prevalence of births in teenagers admitted to the Santander Teaching Hospital (STH) over a year-long period (2006 and 2007) and the factors associated with the likelihood of teenage pregnancy for this region. Methodology: this was a cross-sectional study of 273 systematically and randomly selected females who underwent vaginal and caesarean births in the STH between July 2006 and July 2007. A survey was applied which included variables of interest (sociodemographic, family, psychological); the information was completed with the females' clinical history and Epi Info™ 2000 and Stata™ 8.0 were used for analysing the data. Results: there was 31.14% (25.8-37.0 95%CI) prevalence for deliveries in patients aged less than 19. Factors disposing against teenage pregnancy included: being worried about the future (OR = 0.5), late onset of sexual activity (OR = 0.51) and not having received sexual education from parents (OR = 0.3). Risk factors were unplanned pregnancy (OR = 2.35) and not using contraceptive methods (OR = 2.35). Conclusions: the findings revealed a prevalence which was far higher than that found in similar local, national and international studies.