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Background: Weight estimation in paediatric emergencies is often required to calculate drug dosages, fluid therapy and defibrillation. The ‘gold standard’ of actually weighing the patient is not practically possible in emergency conditions. Many formulae have been developed in an attempt to accurately estimate a child’s weight using age like advanced paediatric life support (APLS), Luscombe, and Argall’s modification. However, these formulae might not be applicable in the Indian context. This study aims is to validate standard age-based formulae (APLS, Luscombe, and Argall’s) and their accuracy in estimating the weight of Indian children. Methods: The study used secondary data from the fourth round of the National Family Health Survey (2015-16). The estimated weights as computed by the APLS guidelines, the Luscombe and the Argall formulae were compared to their respective measured weights during the survey. Results: All three formulae (APLS, Luscombe, and Argall) overestimated the weights. The APLS formula exhibited the least weight difference among the different age groups (-3.51±2.08 kg). The average percentage difference between the estimated weights using the APLS, Luscombe, and Argall formula and the actual weights was 23%, 38%, and 28%, respectively. Conclusions: All the three age-based weight formulae, namely APLS, Argyll, and Luscombe, overestimated the weight among the Indian children, clearly showing the need to adjust the formulae for accurate weight estimation of Indian children.

Perinatal mortality (PM) is a major public health problem in India and multiple maternal and foetal risk factors have been attributed to high perinatal mortality. This review aimed to systematically summarize the epidemiological literature on maternal and fetal risk factors for PM including those for still birth, intrauterine deaths; early neonatal mortality; early neonatal deaths in India. This systematic review was compliant with preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. We searched for peer-reviewed articles from three electronic bibliographic databases: MEDLINE, Embase, Google Scholar published between 1 January 2000 and 31 March 2019 that reported the risk factors of perinatal mortality in India. Observational studies (cross sectional, case-control and COHORT Studies). Eighteen articles were included in this review. The major risk factors identified for perinatal mortality in India were maternal age, parity, higher birth order and maternal anemia. Complications during pregnancy like ante partum hemorrhage, preeclampsia, obstructed labor, preterm labor and fetal factors like gestational age and low birth weight were documented as risk factors for perinatal deaths. Strengthening national health programs and targeted interventions for both antenatal and institutional care is required to bring down perinatal deaths in India.

Background: Child undernutrition is a major public health problem in many low and middle income countries and malnutrition alone accounted for 45% (3 million deaths annually) deaths among under-five children. Malnutrition is the concealed cause of one out of every two such deaths. A study was undertaken to examine the trends, determinants and socioeconomic-related inequalities in childhood undernutrition in empowered action group (EAG) states, India. The secondary data of the two rounds of National Family Health Survey, NFHS-3 (2005-06) and NFHS-4 (2015-16) comprising of 16,802 and 128,400 children aged 0-59 months respectively was analysed.Methods: Non-linear Fairlie decomposition was used to identify and quantify the separate contribution of different socioeconomic characteristics in gap of childhood malnutrion between 2006 and 2016.Results: Results show that the prevalence of undernutrition has decreased in EAG states during the last one decade, but the prevalence of wasting is remained almost same as 10 years back. The decomposition analysis shows that maternal education, household wealth and place of residence were contributing to socioeconomic inequality in childhood undernutrition from 2006 to 2016.Conclusions: There is a need to adopt different strategies of health policy intervention. It is important to have policies towards improving female literacy in the EAG states because maternal education plays a vital role in child health and literacy rate is very low among women in EAG states. The existence of a functional health insurance system and increasing universal coverage are recommended to mitigate child undernutrition, so that the vulnerable and deprived populations who are not able to access health care facilities, can easily access health care services for early detection and treatment of undernutrition without any financial constraint.