WHAT WE DO: Safe Motherhood

Throughout the world, one woman dies every minute during pregnancy or childbirth. Forty-two percent of all pregnant women suffer complications, and survival often depends on the access to care that women have. Over the course of our history, Pathfinder has supported integrated and comprehensive services. Pathfinder’s contributions to post-abortion care—both at the service delivery and community level—are globally recognized. Our community interventions to improve healthy practices such as delaying early marriage and first pregnancy, expanding access to contraception and family planning, and increasing the availability of antenatal care, skilled delivery, and postpartum care, are widely respected.

In recent years, Pathfinder has escalated its safe motherhood work, initiating programs that include training midwives and skilled birth attendants to help ensure safe pregnancies and deliveries; promoting life-saving, emergency obstetric care to address complications such as postpartum hemorrhage; and supporting engaged communities to ensure that they are aware of danger signs and can transport women to facilities where emergency care is available. The goal of Pathfinder’s work in safe motherhood is to provide a continuum of care so that women have access to help at every point during pregnancy and childbirth—from the household to the hospital.  

Featured Projects

	India and Nigeria: Continuum of Care: Addressing Postpartum Hemorrhage in India and Nigeria: A major project, the continuum of care model focuses on prevention and care of postpartum hemorrhage at all levels—from the household to the hospital.

	Ghana: Obstetric Fistula Prevention and Treatment: Raising fistula awareness; increasing the availability and accessibility of fistula prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation services.

	Kenya: Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission of HIV/AIDS: Providing HIV counseling and testing services to expectant mothers and delivering antiretroviral therapy that prevents the transmission of HIV from mother-to-child.

	Youth-Friendly Postabortion Care: A one-year project addressing unsafe abortion among adolescent women in Angola, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Mozambique, Tanzania, and Uganda.

Featured Publications

More Publications: Maternal and Child Health 

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Marketing Safe Motherhood: Outreach promotes antenatal care in the marketplace, fosters community ownership.

Pathfinder/Peru Announces 2007 Anonymous Heroes—Saving Women's Lives: Organization honored for its efforts to help women in Peru.