Obstetric and perinatal characteristics in patients with birth canal tears

Abstract

Introduction: birth canal tears are undesirable complications that occur during vaginal delivery, causing aesthetic and functional problems in the perineum or in the birth canal itself. Its prevalence, far from decreasing with current knowledge of obstetric medicine, has been gradually increasing in recent years.
Objective: to determine the obstetric and perinatal characteristics in patients with birth canal tears treated at the Centro Médico Nacional– Hospital Nacional in the period of 2021-2022.
Methodology: this was an observational, descriptive, cross-sectional, and retrospective study, including women with birth canal injuries treated at the Centro Médico Nacional– Hospital Nacional in the period 2021-2022.Descriptive statistics were used for the data analysis.
Results: 198 women with birth canal injuries were identified. The most frequent age range was 19- 29 years and most of them lived in the Central department. Most of the birth canal tears were observed innulliparous women (47.5 %) and without a previous cesarean section (92.9 %); the most frequent injury was the cervical tear (64.1 %). The most common morbidity was uterine atony (20.7 %). Regarding perinatal data, normal weight and term gestational age were more frequent.
Conclusion: cervical tears were the most frequent birth canal injury in nulliparous women without previous cesarean section with an age range of 19-29 years and from the Central department.