Forecasting Maternal Complications Based on the Impact of Gross National Income Using Various Models for Rwanda

Introduction: Preferably maternal mortalities are predominant in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). In some African countries, including Rwanda, programs related to health-care delivery to reduce significantly severe complications including mortalities are established. Unfortunately, historical and forecasted maternal mortality reduction and the influence of gross national income (GNI) were not accessed. This study is aimed to forecast the three years of maternal mortalities (MMs) based on the influence of gross national income (GNI) in Rwanda.

Methods: The period involved is from January 2009 to April 2018. Data analyzed were obtained from the Central Hospital of the University of Kigali (CHUK) and mined data from the WHO database. Time series approach (Box-Jenkins and exponential smoothing) and linear regression models were applied. Besides, IBM-SPSS and Eviews were used in the analysis.

Results: The results revealed that MMs were not statistically different in several years, and there was a significant correlation between MMs and GNI (-0.610, P value 0.012 < 0.05). A double exponential smoothing model (DESM) was fitted for the best forecast and ARIMA (0,1,0) and linear regression models for a quick forecast.

Conclusion: There was a slight effect of GNI in maternal mortality reduction, which leads to the steady decrease of the forecasted maternal mortality up to May 2021. The Government of Rwanda should intensively strengthen the health-care system, save the children programs, and support pregnant women by using GNI for reducing MMs at an advanced level.