Epidemiological and Clinical Profiles of Maternal Deaths in Cotonou

Abstract

Introduction: Due to its high frequency, maternal mortality remains a major public health problem, especially in developing countries. Therefore, it is important to establish the epidemiological and clinical profiles of women who died in order to adapt the means to fight maternal mortality. The objective was to study maternal deaths in three university associated hospitals in Benin from 2015 to 2020. Materials and methods: This was a descriptive cross-sectional and retrospective study. Were included women who died during pregnancy or within the 42 days after delivery from January 2015 to September 2020 in the maternity units of National and University Associated Hospital-Hubert Koutoukou Maga (CNHU-HKM), University Associated Hospital of Mother and Child (CHU-MEL) and Army training hospital- University-associated hospital (HIA-CHU). Results: In total, 575 cases of maternal deaths were recorded and the majority at the maternity unit of CNHU-HKM (79.30%). The average age was 29.1 (±6.5) years with extremes of 14 and 45 years. The majority of death was observed in women aged 25 to 29 years. The deceased women were most often pauciparous (33.57%), referred (78.96%), admitted in poor general condition (58.43%) and were in the postpartum period (80.17%) at the time of death. The main causes of maternal death were: haemorrhage (32.87%), hypertensive disorders during pregnancy (22.22%), infections (8.35%) and abortion (5.74%). Conclusion: Maternal mortality remains high in our health facilities. It mainly affects populations with modest socio-economic conditions. The reduction of maternal mortality requires an improvement in the socio-economic conditions of the population, in the technical platform and in the referral modalities.