The Prealence And Risk Factors Of Sexually Transmitted Infections Among Pregnant Refugee Women In Three Baptist Health Institutions In Yaounde, Center Region Of Cameroon

Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) is a major public health challenge because of its unmeasurable negative impact on sexual and reproductive health globally hence, identifying the risk factors is important in curtailing acquisition and transmission. Cameroon hosts over 4 80,000 refugees from nearby countries so, establishing the prevalence and risk factors of STIs among pregnant refugee women is of public health interest since they are the second most common cause of death among women between 15 44 years in Africa. This wa s a retrospective, cross sectional, non experimental hospital based study among pregnant refugee women where ANC (Antenatal) records were explored to establish the prevalence and structured questionnaire administered in their communities to identify risk f actors in Yaounde’. Descriptive statistics was used to analyze the demographic data and Logistic regression was performed to determine the associations between dependent (STIs) and independent variables (age, marital status, educational level, employment) using Pearson’s Chi square, P<0.05 considered as significant with 95% CI. A general infection prevalence of 218/522 (41.76 %) was established with the following infections identified ; hepatitis B 35(6.70%), candidiasis 21(4.02%), HIV 19(3.64%), syphilis 1 3(2.49%) where BV 84(16.09%) and UTI 111(21.26%) considered
predisposing factors to STIs with significant difference among infections. The highest prevalence of 63(43.15%) was among age group >30years, 64(100%) of them were not married, 64(100%) formally u nemployed, 40(62%) of them had no formal education and 23(36%) had little knowledge on STIs. More public health intervention programs could be strengthened to promote reproductive health in pregnant women, with a focus on refugee women in Cameroon who are mostly exposed to un wanted pregnancies and abuses.