18. Abu Munshar, J. and Hammuri, M. The Role of the Daya in Home Delivery and its Outcome In the Hebron Area, 1987.

A retrospective study was made of notified home births in the Hebron district between March 1 and March 20 of 1987. A total of 292 registered home deliveries were followed up through a home visit during which a questionnaire was administered to the mother. A separate questionnaire was given to the midwife if one had been present at the delivery.

The findings of the study include the following:
Eighty-five percent of home births occurred in villages or refugee camps. Only one of the 292 surveyed mothers reported having a job. Sixty-one percent of mothers did not have any kind of ante-natal care during pregnancy. Twenty-one percent of mothers utilized government MCH clinics and 11% went to private practitioners. Midwives attended 74% of the births, physicians attended 5% and family members attended 19% of the births.

Infant mortality was estimated at 70/1000 live births and the miscarriage rate was estimated at 99 per 1000 pregnancies. Fifty-eight percent of mothers said that they delivered at home, the hospital was too expensive or that they had no health insurance.

At two months of age, 5% of children were drinking bottle milk only and 9% were fed on both bottle and breast milk. A total of 67 dayas were interviewed, of whom 55 (89%) were aged more than 49 years. Seventy percent of the dayas delivered five or less children per month. All dayas reported making follow-up visits to mothers after delivery.

One curious finding was that the village Mukhtars normally invented registered birth weights as the dayas did not carry scales with them. The article recommends that antenatal care promotion be enhanced and PHC services and daya training be expanded. It argues that pregnant women should have the right to free clinic and hospital MCH services.