Maternal perception of fetal movement type: the effect of gestational age and maternal factors

Objective: To assess maternal perception of fetal movement types and its association with maternal factors in normal pregnancies with good pregnancy outcome. Methods: This study was conducted on 729 normotensive singleton pregnant women with good pregnancy outcome who had referred for prenatal visit. After completing a questionnaire, the participants were asked to count fetal movements for 1 h/3 times/day. They were also asked to identify the type of fetal movement: general body movement (GBM) (rolling and stretching/strong), isolated limb movement (ILM; simple flutter or kicks/weak), trunk movement (TM) (strong jab, startle/strong), or hiccup movement (HM) (high frequency and rapid/weak). All the participants were followed till delivery to exclude pregnant women with preterm birth and/or small for gestational age from the study. Results: 90.8% of participants perceived GBM, which was independently associated with maternal unemployment (OR = 2.28, 95% CI = 1.18- 4.4). 74.2% of participants perceived TM, which was associated with multiparity (OR = 1.69, 95% CI = 1.18- 2.4). 86.3% perceived ILM, which was independently associated with maternal unemployment (OR = 2.67, 95% CI = 1.53-4.68), lower gestational age (OR = 2.17, 95% CI = 1.28-3.67), perception of fetal movements at night (OR = 2.05, 95% CI = 1.27-3.32), and multiparity (OR = 1.68, 95% CI = 1.04-2.72). 36.6% perceived HM, which was independently associated with higher gestational age (OR = 1.71, 95% CI = 1.2-2.44). Conclusions: Most pregnant women could discriminate changes in fetal movement type that follow a general pattern through the third gestational trimester, however this can be affected by maternal employment, parity and time of perception.