ArticleTropical medicine & international health : TM & IH2015
Getting the basic rights - the role of water, sanitation and hygiene in maternal and reproductive health: a conceptual framework.
Article in Tropical medicine & international health : TM & IH, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 30 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
30 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 90 citations in OpenAlex.
- Interventions to improve linear growth during exclusive breastfeeding life-stage for children aged 0-6 months living in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review with network and pairwise meta-analyses.Gates open research · 2019Pooled it
- Interventions to improve birth outcomes of pregnant women living in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review and network meta-analysis.Gates open research · 2019Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Challenges in developing methods for quantifying the effects of weather and climate on water-associated diseases: A systematic review.PLoS neglected tropical diseases · 2017Pooled it
- Infectious diseases in pregnancy in Sri Lanka: gaps in surveillance, diagnosis, and policy: a scoping review.BMC infectious diseases · 2026Article
- External Disruption of Ocular DevelopmentThe Yale journal of biology and medicine · 2024Review
- Review
- Article
- Using household survey data to explore the effects of the domiciliary environment on weight at birth: a multilevel mixed-effects analysis of the 2016 Ethiopian Demographic Health Survey.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2023Article
- Present and Future Drinking Water Security and Its Impacts on Maternities: A Multi-Scale Assessment of Sudan.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- Evaluation of a WASH/MNCH targeted primary health care program in Uganda; a mixed methods study.Health psychology and behavioral medicine · 2023Article
- The effect of health insurance and socioeconomic status on women's choice in birth attendant and place of delivery across regions in Indonesia: a multinomial logit analysis.BMJ global health · 2023Article
- Lived experiences of women with low birth weight infants in the Solomon Islands: A descriptive qualitative study.PLOS global public health · 2022Article
- Interventions promoting uptake of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) technologies in low- and middle-income countries: An evidence and gap map of effectiveness studies.Campbell systematic reviews · 2021Article
- Community-level impacts of sanitation coverage on maternal and neonatal health: a retrospective cohort of survey data.BMJ global health · 2021Article
- Water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) facilities and infection control/prevention practices in traditional birth homes in Southwest Nigeria.BMC health services research · 2021Article
- PROTOCOL: What is the impact of complex WASH interventions on gender and social equality outcomes in low- and middle-income countries? A mixed-method systematic review protocol.Campbell systematic reviews · 2021Article
- The extent to which the design of available reproductive health interventions fit the reproductive health needs of adolescents living in urban poor settings of Kisenyi, Kampala, Uganda.BMC public health · 2021Article
- PROTOCOL: Water, sanitation and hygiene for reducing childhood mortality in low- and middle-income countries.Campbell systematic reviews · 2021Article
- When Land Is Under Pressure Health Is Under Stress.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo explore linkages between water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) and maternal and perinatal health via a conceptual approach and a scoping review.
methodsWe developed a conceptual framework iteratively, amalgamating three literature-based lenses. We then searched literature and identified risk factors potentially linked to maternal and perinatal health. We conducted a systematic scoping review for all chemical and biological WASH risk factors identified using text and MeSH terms, limiting results to systematic reviews or meta-analyses. The remaining 10 complex behavioural associations were not reviewed systematically.
resultsThe main ways poor WASH could lead to adverse outcomes are via two non-exclusive categories: 1. 'In-water' associations: (a) Inorganic contaminants, and (b) 'water-system' related infections, (c) 'water-based' infections, and (d) 'water borne' infections. 2. 'Behaviour' associations: (e) Behaviours leading to water-washed infections, (f) Water-related insect-vector infections, and (g-i) Behaviours leading to non-infectious diseases/conditions. We added a gender inequality and a life course lens to the above framework to identify whether WASH affected health of mothers in particular, and acted beyond the immediate effects. This framework led us to identifying 77 risk mechanisms (67 chemical or biological factors and 10 complex behavioural factors) linking WASH to maternal and perinatal health outcomes.
conclusionWASH affects the risk of adverse maternal and perinatal health outcomes; these exposures are multiple and overlapping and may be distant from the immediate health outcome. Much of the evidence is weak, based on observational studies and anecdotal evidence, with relatively few systematic reviews. New systematic reviews are required to assess the quality of existing evidence more rigorously, and primary research is required to investigate the magnitude of effects of particular WASH exposures on specific maternal and perinatal outcomes. Whilst major gaps exist, the evidence strongly suggests that poor WASH influences maternal and reproductive health outcomes to the extent that it should be considered in global and national strategies.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.