Factors associated with low birth weight

Reducing neonatal and maternal mortality is one of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The fight against low birth weight is one of the strategies to achieve these goals. The populations of the northern peripheral zones of Ouagadougou, which are informal, unserviced housing areas, were the targets of this study. This was a retrospective cross-sectional study of longitudinal data collected between May 14, 2009 and May 14, 2012, with the objective of analyzing the factors associated with low birth weight in the northern peripheries of Ouagadougou. It included a total of 2919 births and the characteristics of their mothers as explanatory variables. To do this, descriptive (bivariate analysis with the cross-tabulation) and explanatory (multivariate analysis, in particular binary logistic regression) methods of analysis were used in this study.