Stillbirth – newborn indicator in the dark: A rigorous research is required to understand stillbirth rate at the public health facility in Bangladesh

Stillbirth rate is neither being measured in any of the national level research and studies nor it is being discussed strongly at any policy level forums in Bangladesh. It is difficult to understand the actual stillbirth rate at health facility level and thus this newborn indicator remains always in the dark.

We aimed to create evidence by analyzing the national routine Health Management Information System (HMIS) data to emphasize the stillbirth to the government and national level stakeholders to conduct rigorous research to understand the stillbirth rate at all levels of health facility and develop a monitoring framework and guideline to monitor routinely.

Extracted maternal and newborn health related data from DHIS-2 and DGFP Web MIS of government routine HMIS. Data included from medical college hospital (MCH), district hospital (DH) and upazila health complex (UHC) under DGHS and all level of health facilities under DGFP. The period covered from January 2019 to September 2021 and 64 districts included. Stillbirth rate analyzed comparing with other relevant indicators to see the trend.

The overall stillbirth rate accounts 28 per 1,000 births over the period. The stillbirth rate in DGHS health facilities accounts 39 while in DGFP facility 6 per 1,000 births. The stillbirth rate in MCH is 70 per 1,000 births and it was consistently higher over the period. The stillbirth rate in DH and UHC accounts 40 and 18 respectively per 1,000 births.

It is needed to conduct a national level research to understand the actual stillbirth rate in Bangladesh. The research results will help the national program to design an effective intervention which can support to reduce the stillbirth rate and newborn death as a whole in Bangladesh and globally.