摘要：Background: Antenatal care is the systemic medical supervision of women during pregnancy. Its aim is to preserve the physiological aspect of pregnancy and labour and to prevent or detect, as early as possible, all that is pathological. Early diagnosis during pregnancy can prevent maternal ill health, injury, maternal mortality, infant mortality and morbidity. Methodology: It was thus decided to carry out a community based longitudinal study in an urban area at Community health centre, Shahganj, Jaunpur district to observe the effects of the time of antenatal registration, number of antenatal visits, iron folic acid supplementation on the birth weight of the new born. A total of 150 cases were studied who attended the hospital and the information was collected using a pre-tested questionnaire. Results: Out of total 150 pregnant females studied, low birth weight was found in 18.2%. The birth weight of the infant was seen to improve significantly after increasing the number of antenatal visits. Women who had no iron and folic acid supplementation had a higher percentage of low birth weight babies. Lower haemoglobin levels were found to be significantly associated with low birth weight.
