Contribution of Home Uterine Activity Monitoring to the Reduction of Preterm Delivery Rate

Abstract

A service for home-monitoring of uterine-activity was introduced to the Israeli obstetric community. Two hundred three patients at high risk for preterm delivery utilized this service. The patients contacted the center 8,109 times (82% “scheduled” and 18% “acute” contacts). The mean duration of the monitoring was 5 weeks and the average gestational age of delivery was 37 weeks.

Of the study population, 96.4% delivered at term and 3.6% delivered prematurely with a corrected rate of 2.8%. Of the women that were sent to the hospital for evaluation 65% had only increased uterine activity on routine monitoring with no subjective symptoms and therefore would have been missed without this service.

Key Words:

• Preterm delivery prevention