Co-Relation between Doppler and NST as a Predictor of Neonatal Outcome: A Prospective Study

BACKGROUND: The Doppler and Non Stress Test (NST) are very crucial tools for monitoring antenatal cases in the hospital. They play a very crucial role in timely intervention, also with the increasing number of medico-legal cases, they act as evidences to rationalize the actions of the obstetrician. While, NST is a fairly simpler tool, Doppler requires expertise and is not readily available in all setups, at all the times. The aim of the present study was to compare the efficacy of Doppler and NST in prediction of adverse neonatal outcome. METHOD: The present study was conducted at MLN Medical College, Prayagraj over a period of 1 yr from October 2019 to September 2020. A total of 200 ANC cases attending the IPD of Department of Obstetrics were studied and divided into 4 Groups based on their Doppler and NST findings, Group I had both tests normal, Group II had abnormal Doppler but normal NST, Group III had normal Doppler but abnormal NST, and Group IV had both the tests abnormal. They were then followed up for neonatal outcome. The results were compiled and analyzed using appropriate statistical tools. RESULT: 28 % patients had abnormal Doppler, while 35 % had a non reactive NST. The number of patients in each of the Groups was: 115 (Group I), 15 (Group II), 29 (Group III), 41 (Group IV). NICU admission rate was least (0.9 %) in Group I, while it was maximum in Group IV (95 %). All the neonatal deaths (a total of 6 deaths) were seen among patients who belonged to Group IV. CONCLUSION: From this study, we concluded that the combination of Doppler and NST for antenatal fetal monitoring can provide us with wealth of information and is ideally suited for fetal well-being assessment. Taking into consideration the limitation of manpower, expertise and machinery in various health care centers around the country, it is not practically applicable to perform both the tests in all the cases. While Doppler was seen to identify abnormalities earlier and provide us with a lead ti