The government of Ghana and key stakeholders have put into place several interventions aimed at reducing maternal deaths. At the institutional level, the conduct of maternal deaths audit has been instituted. This also contributes to reducing maternal deaths as shortcomings that may have contributed to such deaths could be identified to inform best practice and forestall such occurrences in the ...

OBJECTIVE In 2009, the Ministry of Health of Morocco launched a national confidential enquiry around maternal deaths based on the newly implemented routine maternal death surveillance system (MDSS). The objective of this paper is to show the importance of substandard care among the factors associated with maternal deaths. METHODS The Moroccan National Expert Committee (NEC) organised an audit...

BACKGROUND Current estimates of maternal mortality ratios in Kenya are at least as high as 560 deaths per 100,000 live births. Given the pervasive poverty and lack of quality health services in slum areas, the maternal mortality situation in this setting can only be expected to be worse. With a functioning health care system, most maternal deaths are avoidable if complications are identified ea...

The study describes the characteristics of maternal deaths in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, during 2000-2003. After investigation by public-health services, 217 maternal deaths were identified among predominantly non-white (48.9%), single (57.1%) women aged 29.6 +/- 7.3 years on average. Direct obstetric causes corresponded to 77.4% of the maternal deaths, mainly due to hypertensive disor...

In 1971 344 700 people sustained non-fatal injuries in road traffic accidents, and of these probably 8% (27 576) were back seat passengers. This figure is unlikely to be less in the subsequent years. Of these 27 576 passengers no fewer than half will have received moderate or severe injuries. Most authorities now accept that there is a dramatic reduction in the severity of injuries, in particul...

BACKGROUND Reducing maternal mortality remains a major challenge for health care systems worldwide. The factors related to maternal mortality were extensively researched, and maternal death clusters around labour, delivery and the immediate postpartum period. Studies on the quality of maternal care in academic medical centre settings in low income countries are uncommon. METHODS A retrospecti...

BACKGROUND The reduction of maternal deaths is a key international development goal. Evidence-based health policies and programmes aiming to reduce maternal deaths need reliable and valid information. We undertook a systematic review to determine the distribution of causes of maternal deaths. METHODS We selected datasets using prespecified criteria, and recorded dataset characteristics, metho...

OBJECTIVE To compare methodology used to assign cause of and factors contributing to maternal death. DESIGN Reproductive Age Mortality Study. SETTING Malawi. POPULATION Maternal deaths among women of reproductive age. METHODS We compared cause of death as assigned by a facility-based maternal death review team, an expert panel using the International Classification of Disease, 10th revi...