Migrant Women’s Utilization of Prenatal Care: A Systematic Review

Our objectives were to determine whether migrant women in Western industrialized countries have higher odds of inadequate prenatal care (PNC) compared to receiving-country women and to summarize factors that are associated with inadequate PNC among migrant women in these countries. We conducted searches of electronic databases (MEDLINE, EMBASE, and PsycINFO), reference lists, known experts, and an existing database of the Reproductive Outcomes And Migration international research collaboration for articles published between January, 1995 and April, 2010. Title and abstract review and quality appraisal were conducted independently by 2 reviewers using established criteria, with consensus achieved through discussion. In this systematic review of 29 studies, the majority of studies demonstrated that migrant women were more likely to receive inadequate PNC than receiving-country women, with most reporting moderate to large effect sizes. Rates of inadequate PNC among migrant women varied widely by country of birth. Only three studies explored predictors of inadequate PNC among migrant women. These studies found that inadequate PNC among migrant women was associated with being less than 20 years of age, multiparous, single, having poor or fair language proficiency, education less than 5 years, an unplanned pregnancy, and not having health insurance. We concluded that migrant women as a whole were more likely to have inadequate PNC and the magnitude of this risk differed by country of origin. Few studies addressed predictors of PNC utilization in migrant women and this limits our ability to provide effective PNC in this population.