BACKGROUND The postnatal period is the ideal time to deliver interventions to improve the health of both the newborn and the mother. However, postnatal care shows low-level coverage in a large number of countries. The objectives of this study were to: 1) investigate inequities in maternal postnatal visits, 2) examine differences in postnatal care coverage between public and private providers an...

Emergency department (ED) births are rare. In most cases, patients in labor are triaged directly to the obstetric suite for urgent management, maintaining a continuum of care with their primary providers. Because some births are precipitous and obstetric resources may not be immediately available, the emergency physician must possess the basic skills for intrapartum management of both normal an...

BACKGROUND AND METHODS To guide achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, we used the Lives Saved Tool to provide a novel simulation of potential maternal, fetal, and newborn lives and costs saved by scaling up midwifery and obstetrics services, including family planning, in 58 low- and middle-income countries. Typical midwifery and obstetrics interventions were scaled to either 60% of t...

OBJECTIVES To assess health outcomes of home follow-up visits after postpartum discharge and assess relationships between the number of home visits and selected outcomes among women who gave birth at two Queensland, Australia, regional hospitals. DESIGN A cross sectional study. Services provided during the home visits were responsive to a woman's need rather than having a structured protocol ...

BACKGROUND Although surveys have identified that women are generally highly satisfied with maternity care provision, those aspects of care that women highlight as most important for achieving satisfaction and a satisfactory maternity care experience have not been reported. The aim of this study was to investigate how women understand and experience their maternity care and to report which aspec...

AIM To gain a deeper understanding of first-time parents' experiences of early discharge from hospital after delivery and home-based postnatal care. MATERIAL AND METHODS The study was comprised of focus group interviews, interviews with couples and with fathers. Twenty-one parents participated. INCLUSION CRITERIA healthy women who have given birth to their first child after a normal pregnan...

INTRODUCTION Maternal care is affected by socioeconomic factors. This study analyses the effect of maternal education, employment and citizenship on some antenatal and postnatal care indicators in Italy. METHODS Data are from two population-based follow-up surveys conducted to evaluate the quality of maternal care in 25 Italian Local Health Units in 2008/9 and 2010/1 (6942 women). Logistic mo...

Despite appropriate guidelines, healthcare services worldwide often fail to deliver high-impact evidence-based care. This case study describes a large-scale programme to improve integrated postpartum care for mothers and newborns in Niger and Mali. As a result of an improvement effort based on common objectives, local ownership and shared learning to accelerate implementation of best practices,...

The Philippines annual birth cohort of over 2 million is the second largest in the Western Pacific Region; 44% of births occur outside health facilities. With third dose infant hepatitis B (HB) vaccine coverage of 43% in 2006, erratic vaccine supply, and lack of policies or processes for universal HB vaccine birth dose delivery, a substantial burden of preventable chronic HB infection continues...

OBJECTIVES More disabled women are becoming mothers, and yet, their care is rarely the focus of quantitative research. This study aimed to investigate access and quality of maternity care for women with differing disabilities. DESIGN Secondary analysis was conducted on data from a 2015 national survey of women's experience of maternity care. Descriptive and adjusted analyses were undertaken f...