Maternal mortality in an academic institution in Upper Egypt

Maternal mortality is a worldwide problem. Measuring maternal mortality and identifying its causes is essential, and should be assessed regularly for the purpose of planning, monitoring and evaluation of provided maternal health care. Quality of care indicators such as case fatality rate is used to measure the facility performance, in particular, quality and promptness of care. This descriptive study aimed to calculate maternal mortality ratio, quality of care indicators such as maternal mortality index, case fatality and direct obstetric case fatality rate for the Women's Health Hospital and identify causes of maternal mortality, and the main deficits in medical records. The Maternal mortality ratio was alarmingly high in Women's Health Hospital, Assiut University, Egypt reaching 225/100,000, however, those who delivered in the hospital, the MMR was 100.5/100,000. The leading causes of maternal death were obstetric haemorrhage (38.3%), complications of caesarean sections (27.7%) and pre-eclampsia/eclampsia (23.4%). Nearly half (42%) of the deaths occurred during vacations. Quality indicators revealed poor quality of health care.