This sad phenomenon is becoming quite common in Nigeria and I discussed with Dr. Benedicta Adokuru, a practicing medical doctor in Abuja who shared her thoughts on this subject matter.
According to her, the major causes of this incidence are categorised into two;
Obstetric causes and Non-obstetric causes.
1. Obstetric causes
These are more or less natural circumstances that could occur during and after childbirth such as bleeding, infections, complications of unsafe abortion, eclampsia etc of which there are existing measures that could be taken to address such challenges in a well equipped facility.
2. Non-obstetric causes
These are factors not directly related to pregnancy such as;
- The age of the woman;
Underaged girls (early teenagers) do not possess matured pelvis that would allow a baby to easily pass through. Older women (above 45yrs) are not advised to get pregnant as the risks of developing complications are quite high.
- Women who do not go for antenatal checks.
- Domestic violence.
- Overwhelmed medical personnel and facilities;
There are situations in which a medical doctor has to attend to like a hundred or more patients daily of which at some point they get fatigued and can no longer pay attention to details required to accurately diagnose a patient.
- Religious and cultural beliefs;
There are women who will prefer to deliver their children in prayer houses or traditional birth houses than go to a hospital for reasons best known to them.
There are instances where the position of a baby is transverse and may require a caesarian section for successful delivery but many women/men reject the idea like a bad omen. Some women feel that if they don't push their baby, they will not be considered as real women.
The individual interpretation of certain people makes one question what their pastors feed them with. There was a recent case where a woman was in a labour room to give birth and the umbilical cord was the first to come out as it was already prolapse and the situation required immediate surgery. The woman refused going to the Theatre, insisting that her pastor had to come and pray first. Pastor took 45mins to arrive and the baby was lost.
- Poverty
Healthcare is expensive. There are a lot of women out there who long to visit standard health care facilities when pregnant but are unable to afford it. Access to standard health facilities in remote villages is another debilitating factor.
In all of these, we can clearly see that with proper awareness and sensitisation of families, provision of well equipped health care facilities and sufficient skilled personnel, we can significantly drop the current maternal mortality rate by over 50 percent.
