MRC Maternal and Infant Health Care Strategies Research Unit

the Medical Research Council Maternal and infant Health Care strategies Research unit was established in partnership with the University of Pretoria in 1997 under the directorship of Professor Bob Pattinson. although most of the original research team has moved to new positions often in other countries, new researchers have joined and the research mandate upon which the unit was built has remained the same. Our research mandate has been to develop health strategies at primary and secondary care levels for mothers and infants by seeking saleable solutions. By seeking we mean performing research; by saleable we mean solutions that are acceptable to all namely women, health care workers and health administrators; and by solutions we mean health strategies that have been developed to solve the problems identified. the unit has established two national survey systems in perinatal care and child care and has developed the database and does the analysis of the data for the Confidential Enquiry into Maternal Deaths in south africa. the three national survey reports (Saving Mothers, Saving Babies and Saving Children) have clearly identified the major diseases causing maternal, perinatal and child deaths and also the major health system failures. the unit has also developed a maternal near miss audit system, the basis of which is being used in the WHO Global survey of maternal morbidity in 27 countries throughout the world. a neonatal near miss audit system developed by the unit is currently being tested. initially the unit was involved in performing multicentre randomized trials on common problems such as preterm labour, pre-eclampsia and eclampsia and managing normal term labour, to develop effecMRC Maternal and Infant Health Care Strategies Research Unit