Basic Information: How is maternal mortality defined?
A pregnancy-related death is defined as:
- the death of a woman while pregnant or within 42 days of termination of pregnancy, irrespective of the cause of death.
This is a time-of-death definition.
A maternal death is defined as:
- the death of a woman while pregnant or within 42 days of termination of pregnancy, irrespective of the duration and the site of the pregnancy, from any cause related to or aggravated by the pregnancy or its management but not from accidental or incidental causes.
This definition requires cause-of-death information so that incidental causes can be excluded and maternal deaths can be subdivided into two groups: direct obstetric deaths and indirect obstetric deaths.
A late maternal death is defined as:
- the death of a woman from direct or indirect obstetric causes more than 42 days but less than one year after termination of pregnancy.
A direct obstetric death is defined as:
- death resulting from obstetric complications of the pregnant state (pregnancy, labour and the puerperium), from interventions, omissions, incorrect treatment, or from a chain of events resulting from any of the above.
An indirect obstetric death is defined as:
- death resulting from previous existing disease or disease that developed during pregnancy and which was not due to direct obstetric causes, but was aggravated by physiologic effects of pregnancy.
Source: International statistical classification of diseases and related health problems, 10th Revision. Geneva: World Health Organization.