Purpose: This systematic review aimed to assess if women living in deprived areas have worse perinatal outcomes than those residing in high-income areas.
Methods: Datasets of PubMed, ScienceDirect, CENTRAL, Embase, and Google Scholar were searched for studies comparing perinatal outcomes (preterm birth, small-for-gestational age, and stillbirth) in deprived and non-deprive areas.
Results: A total of 46 studies were included. The systematic review of the literature revealed a higher risk for adverse perinatal outcomes such as preterm birth, small for gestational age, and stillbirth in deprived areas.
Conclusion: Deprived areas are associated with adverse perinatal outcomes. More multifactorial studies are needed to assess the weight of each factor that composes the socioeconomic gradient of health in adverse perinatal outcomes.
Keywords: Deprivation; Perinatal outcomes; Preterm birth; Small-for-gestational age; Stillbirth.
© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.