ASSESSING THE TREND, CAUSES AND CHARACTERISTICS OF FACILITY- LEVEL MATERNAL MORTALITY IN THE UPPER WEST REGION OF GHANA

Abstract

Maternal mortality remains a major public health challenge despite numerous strategies devised by the international community to curb it. Globally, maternal mortality is the leading cause of death among females within the reproductive age. The Upper West region being one of poorest regions contribute significantly to the high prevalence rate of maternal death at the national level. However, little attention is paid to the factors that lead to these deaths in the Region. The objective of the study is to assess the trend, causes and the characteristics that contribute to the death of mothers in health facilities in the upper west region. The study was a retrospective and descriptive in nature. All maternal death cases that occurred in Upper West Region from 2009 to 2014 were involved. A review of secondary data of 179 institutional maternal death records from all the II districts in the Upper West Region was performed. The data was sorted and coded into Microsoft Excel 20 10 and exported into SPSS version 20.0 for statistical analysis. The findings were processed into frequency tables, charts, and graph. The results indicate an unstable maternal mortality trend in the region with a mortality ratio of 193 deaths/l00,000 live births. The Wa Municipality and the Wa Regional Hospital contributed majority of the cases of 24.0% and 54.2% respectively. Majority of the deaths were within the age range of 20-29 with a median age of 28 years and among the uneducated. The major causes of the maternal deaths recorded included haemorrhagelbleeding, Sepsis, and anaemia. The Primidgravida and nulliparous women were the majority of the deaths with 56.4% of them dying within or after the 36th week of pregnancy. The trend of the maternal mortality in the Upper West Region is unstable but higher than the Millennium development Goal (MDG) MDG goal 5 targeted to be 150MMR per 100,000 live births by the end of 2015 and resulting from well-known factors. Practical steps must be taken by the Regional Health Directorate (RHD) and the District Health Management Teams (DHMTS) to increase collaboration with Chiefs' Queen mothers and other stakeholders to prioritize more resources to disseminate information on the importance of early registration and continue ANC attendance in the region to save the innocent lives.