Kaduna State has recorded about 123 maternal deaths between the period of January-to-June, 2018, out of a total of 10,453 deliveries recorded in 30 pubic secondary and tertiary health facilities.
This was contained in the Synopsis of Kaduna Mid-Year 2018 Maternal and Peri-Natal Deaths Surveillance and Responses (MPDSR) presented by the Chairman, Mallam Lawal Abubakar to Kaduna State Maternal Newborn and Child Health Accountability Mechanism (KADMAM) at the quarterly Interactive forum #Openkadunaministryofhealth Sector held in Kaduna on the 21st of September, 2018.
According to his report, the cause of the 123 deaths include, Post-Partum Haemorrhage, Ante-Partum Haemorrhage, Sepsis, Anaemia, Eclampsia, Ruptured Uterus and Embolism.
“The 123 deaths did not include deaths recorded in Primary Health Care (PHCs) of over 1,000 facilities in the State, did not include private health facility and most importantly, it did not include deaths that has occurred in the community at the population level. This is just a tip of an iceberg.
“One of KADMAM mandate is to use evidence to promote accountability and advocate for the elimination of preventable maternal and Peri-Natal deaths in Kaduna.
“It was an opportunity for KADMAM to get this information and use it as evidence to do some advocacy on maternal care. I want to mention that these reports include Peri-Natal deaths but, this edition is concentrating on maternal deaths.
“We hoped that in the next edition, we are going to look into Peri-Natal deaths which are also very critical, because 600 Peri-Natal deaths were recorded the same period under review between January-to-June 2018” he stressed.
Malllam Abubakar informed that in the course of the investigation, KADMAM identify that the hospitals visited do not have ready to use blood due to lack of a state-owned blood supply chain system, non-functional blood banks due to irregular supply of electricity, non-functional ambulances for emergency referral patients and pregnant women with obstetric complications and do not have Manual Vacuum Aspiration (MVA) kits for the management of incomplete abortion.
“We review the challenges; we said we are going to find out more on the supply side especially on the availability of essential-life-saving drugs in the facilities.
“We conducted the scorecard check, we develop a questionnaire and the report from all the 30 facilities have shown that all the hospitals have adequate stock of Essential-life-saving drugs, which if used effectively could have helped in prevention and management of haemorrhage, sepsis, Eclampsia, Ruptured Uterus and Anamia which are 72% major causes of maternal deaths.
“However, the availability of the essential-life-saving drugs did not translate to the aversion of maternal deaths that is another area needed to research on” Mallam Abubakar lamented.
The former Chairman, Health Reform Foundation of Nigeria (HERFON) Kaduna State therefore observed that the number of women likely to die as a result of pregnancy or child birth can be prevented, if Kaduna State Ministry of Health and Human Services will established a mechanism that would ensure that essential life-saving drugs available to hospitals are accessible to all pregnant women in the state.
According to him, as a matter of urgency, there is need for the repair of all broken-down blood banks and ambulance in the state while all the hospital should have 24/7 electricity to ensure that life-saving equipment are functioning effectively.
Mallam Abubakar recommended that the supply of essential life saving drugs to all public hospitals in the state is highly commendable and should be sustained
