Assessment of Maternal Health Literacy and Its Association With Pregnancy Outcomes Among Women

Background Maternal health literacy is a key factor in helping women acquire, understand, and utilize health information during pregnancy. Poor health literacy may impede effective decision-making and impact maternal and newborn health. The objective of this study was to assess maternal health literacy and its association with pregnancy outcomes among postnatal women in Lahore, Pakistan. Methodology This analytical cross-sectional study was conducted among 374 postnatal women at the University of Lahore, Pakistan, between January 1, 2025, and June 30, 2025. The Maternal Health Literacy and Pregnancy Outcome Questionnaire recorded data, socio-demographic data, and obstetric data. IBM SPSS Statistics software, version 26.0 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY), was used for statistical analyses. Data did not satisfy the assumption of normality, so nonparametric tests were used to explore associations among the study variables. Results Women with live births demonstrated significantly higher maternal health literacy scores than those reporting neonatal deaths (Mann-Whitney U = 214.5, p < 0.001). Pregnancy outcomes were significantly associated with educational status, household income, parity, neonatal birth weight, neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) admission, APGAR score, and maternal comorbidities (all p < 0.05). Conclusions Maternal health literacy was positively associated with favorable pregnancy outcomes. Further prospective studies are required to determine whether interventions aimed at improving maternal health literacy can improve maternal and neonatal outcomes.