AUTHOR=Behboudi-Gandevani Samira , Bidhendi-Yarandi Razieh , Panahi Mohammad Hossein , Mardani Abbas , Gåre Kymre Ingjerd , Paal Piret , Vaismoradi Mojtaba 

TITLE=A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Risk of Stillbirth, Perinatal and Neonatal Mortality in Immigrant Women

JOURNAL=International Journal of Public Health

VOLUME=Volume 67 - 2022

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.ssph-journal.org/journals/international-journal-of-public-health/articles/10.3389/ijph.2022.1604479

DOI=10.3389/ijph.2022.1604479

ISSN=1661-8564

ABSTRACT=Objectives: To quantify by meta-analysis the risk of stillbirth, perinatal and neonatal mortality in migrant women compared to their native-origin counterparts in the host country.
Methods: We performed a systematic-literature-search to identify relevant studies and scored their quality. The random-effects-model was used for the analysis of heterogeneous results. Publication-bias was assessed using the Harbord-test. The calculation of the pooled odds ratio of events was performed using the DerSimonian and Laird, and inverse-variance-methods. 
Results: The systematic-review and meta-analysis involved 45 studies consisting of 8,419,435 pregnant-women with the immigration background and 40,113,869 native-origin controls. The risk of stillbirth (Pooled-OR=1.35,95%CI=1.22-1.50), perinatal-mortality (Pooled-OR=1.50,95%CI=1.35-1.68) and neonatal-mortality (Pooled-OR=1.09,95% CI=1.00-1.19) in the immigrant mothers were significantly higher than the native-origin population in host countries. The sensitivity analyses showed that the all results were highly consistent with the main data analysis results. 
Conclusion: Risk of stillbirth, perinatal and neonatal mortality increased among the immigrant women compare to the native-origin population. Our review findings inform healthcare-providers and policy makers to apply more efforts in order to improve the provision of maternal and neonatal healthcare to this minor vulnerable population.