4-day IIM-A workshop on maternal mortality

The Indian Institute of Management - Ahmedabad (IIM-A) will conduct a four-day workshop on 'Maternal mortality reduction by improving emergency obstetric care in India'.

The workshop, which will begin on Wednesday at IIM-A, will target personnel and decision makers in the health and family welfare departments of the state.

The programme will have presentations and discussions by various experts on issues related to effective strategies to reduce maternal deaths.

IIM-A will organise the event in collaboration with Averting Medical Deaths and Disability (AMDD), Columbia University. AMDD is a global programme funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The secretaries and commissioners of the family welfare and health, project directors of state health system development projects, joint secretaries in charge of health projects, directors of projects concerning family welfare, officials of rural hospitals and others will be invited for the workshop.

Maternal health is defined as the death of women while being pregnant or within 42 days of termination of pregnancy from any cause related to or aggravated by pregnancy or its management.

According to a study conducted by professor Dileep Mavalankar of the public systems group, IIM-A, the maternal mortality ratio (MMR) is maternal death per 100,000 live births in one year.

Reliable estimates of maternal mortality in India are not available, but some efforts have been made to assess the levels of maternal mortality using surveys, special studies or indirect estimation.

WHO estimates show that out of the 529,000 maternal deaths globally each year, 36,000 (25.7 per cent) are contributed by India, the highest by a single country.

In spite of a policy commitment to reduce maternal mortality rate in India, MMR has not declined substantially in India.

Even today one lakh women die in India every year during child birth. If India has to achieve its health policy objective of reducing maternal mortality by two thirds by the year 2015, concerted efforts will have to be done at the state level and one of the strategies to reduce maternal mortality is to improve availability, utilisation and quality of EmOC in the country, the study says.