Factors Associated With Awareness Of Literate Mothers About Newborn Screening: A Cross-Sectional Study From A Low-Middle-Income Country.

Objectives: To explore the awarenesslevel of literate mothersregarding newborn screening programmes, and to evaluate the associated factors.

Methods: The descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted at the Section of Chemical Pathology, Department of Pathology andLaboratoryMedicine,AgaKhanUniversity,Karachi,fromJanuary toSeptember 2021, andcomprisedmothers aged 18 years or more. Data was collected using a structured questionnaire about newborn screening, and the subjects were compared in terms of age, residential background, education and parity. Data was analysed using SPSS 23.

Results: Of the 1016 responses, 896(88.2%) were analysed. The mean age of the sample was 37.7±10.87 years. There were 470(52.4%) mothers aged 31-45 years, 859(95.87%) were from urban areas, 751(84%) had a graduate degree, 652(72.7%) weremultiparous andhad824(91.9%)hadhealthy children.Overall, 386 (43%)mothershadawarenessofnewbornscreening programmes. The main factors associated with awareness were age, education, primiparity, having healthy children, and province ofresidencebeing Sindh andPunjab(p<0.05),while the urban-ruraldividedwas not a significantfactor(p=0.737). Cost of healthcare 417(46.5%) and lack of awareness among physicians 356(39.7%) were identified asthe main challenges in establishing newborn screening servicesin the country.

Conclusions: The awareness among mothers about new born screening programmes was generally low among the subjects studied.