Having a baby in the United States can be dangerous. American women are more likely than women in any other developed countryto die during childbirth or from pregnancy-related complications. And while other countries' maternal death rates have gone down, U.S. rates have risen since 2000, a fact that has left both doctors and expectant mothers concerned about the state of maternity care in this country.
But many of these problems could be prevented if hospitals would standardize the way they care for women in labor, according to the authors of a recent essay in the New England Journal of Medicine.They say hospitals can improve quality of care for three common complications in childbirth: heavy bleeding after delivery known as postpartum hemorrhage, problems with high blood pressure, and blood clots before or after delivery.
If hospitals check every single patient for these conditions, the authors say, and use research-backed protocols to treat them, obstetricians can help fight the high rate of maternal deaths, which they call a national "tragedy."
[For more on this story by MARA GORDON, go to https://www.npr.org/sections/h...nal-mortality-crisis]
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