The prevalence of prenatal reporting to child protection is estimated to be 3% of Australian pregnancies. Understanding risk factors associated with prenatal child protection involvement is critical in identifying the needs of families who may benefit from early intervention. This paper reports findings of a case file review examining characteristics of families reported prenatally. Unit-record administrative data were extracted for unborn children reported to child protection in a single Australian jurisdiction during 2014. Intake reports relating to a 20% random sample (n=131 unborn children) were coded using a tailored coding guide developed for this study. Most families were reported to be experiencing three or more risk factors, including current or previous intimate partner violence (70% of families), parental alcohol and other drug use (63%), parental mental health concerns (58%) or parent criminal activity (34%). Over one-third of parents in the sample had themselves experienced abuse and neglect as children. In families with more than one child, more than 90% of older siblings of unborn children had been the subject of a previous report. Supports must address multiple co-occurring problems, often in the context of personal and familial histories of child abuse and neglect, meaning that risks are intergenerational and enduring.

产前报告对儿童保护的患病率估计为澳大利亚怀孕的3％。了解与产前儿童保护相关的危险因素对于确定可能受益于早期干预的家庭的需求至关重要。本文报告了案例文件审查的结果，该报告审查了产前报告家庭的特征。提取了2014年在单个澳大利亚辖区报告给儿童保护的未出生婴儿的单位记录管理数据。使用针对该研究开发的量身定制的编码指南对与20％随机样本（n = 131个未出生婴儿）有关的摄入报告进行编码。据报告，大多数家庭正在经历三个或更多风险因素，包括当前或以前的亲密伴侣暴力（占家庭的70％），父母酗酒和使用其他毒品（63％），父母对精神健康的担忧（58％）或父母犯罪活动（34％）。样本中超过三分之一的父母在孩提时代经历过虐待和忽视。在有一个以上孩子的家庭中，90％以上的未出生婴儿的兄弟姐妹曾是先前报告的主题。支持常常是在虐待和忽视儿童的个人和家族历史的背景下解决多个共同发生的问题，这意味着风险是代际和持久的。