Abstract:
Introduction. Worldwide, the COVID-19 pandemic established common restrictive measures that have
limited access to perinatal care, with unfavourable consequences for perinatal indicators.
Aim of study. Analysis of the access to perinatal care services in the Republic of Moldova (RM) during
COVID-19 pandemic.
Methods and materials. The RM became part of a study called “International Sexual Health and
Reproductive Health during COVID-19” (I-SHARE) using a common instrument for 30 participating
countries. The study included 200 women, the analysis of the obtained results was performed using the
IBM SPSS Statistics V21.0 software.
Results. The study involved 200 women, 183/200 (91.5%) of whom were of reproductive age, on average
33.9 ± 9.6 years old. Higher education had 150/200 (75.0%), besides that 82.0% (164/200) of respondents
were married or in cohabitation. In 73.0% (146/200) cases, the respondents had one or more children, being
familiar with the perinatal management in the RM. The social distancing measures were respected by
173/200 (86.5%) women, and 51.0% (102/200) of them were at least once in self-isolation. In 99/200 cases
(49.5%), patients were tested for SARS-CoV2, in 48.5% (48/99) cases the result was positive; these were
monitored according to the COVID-19 protocol of the RM. At the moment, when the survey was carried
out, 25/200 (12.5%) women were pregnant at various gestational age, 23/200 (11.5%) women gave birth
during the last 2 months, and 19/200 (9.5%) women were planning to conceive, following prenatal
recommendations and/or infertility treatment. In all cases, the pregnancy occurred spontaneous, being
planned in 17/23
Conclusion. The I-SHARE study found that the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted access to prenatal services
due to introducing social distancing and isolation measures. At the same time, due to the increased request
of pregnant and postpartum women, the providing of perinatal services through telemedicine was
encouraged. This allowed the high level of maternal and child health services to be maintained, preventing
perinatal complications.
