View article

The purpose of this study was to investigate retrospectively neonatal health and maternal background among a sample of children taken into custody and placed in foster care and to investigate the relation between medical and social risk in the neonatal period.

The data-linkage study combined two registries: the Finnish Medical Birth Registry (MBR), from January 1, 1987 to December 31, 1989, and the Finnish Child Welfare Registry (CWR) from January 1, 1987 to December 31, 1997 using personal identification numbers (n=1,668). As controls all Finnish children born in 1987 were chosen (n=59,727). Infant neonatal health was estimated using the following indicators: birth-weight and birth-length, birth-weight by gestational age, 1-minute Apgar scores, and discharge age from the nursery. Maternal background characteristics included maternal age, parity, marital status, number of antenatal …