Monitoring in obstetric critical care (“maternal near miss”) in the Northwestern Federal District of the Russian Federation in 2018-2019

This article presents data of monitoring critical obstetric conditions (maternal near miss) for the purpose of auditing the quality of medical care and prevention of maternal mortality, obtained on the basis of an analysis of statistical data from eleven federal subjects of the Northwestern Federal District of the Russian Federation for 2018-2019. We characterized the critical obstetric conditions that allow avoiding maternal mortality cases, which, in modern legal practice, most often require forensic examinations on the fact of providing obstetric and gynecological medical care of inadequate quality. We determined that the main causes of maternal mortality cases (83.1% in 2018 and 84.0% in 2019) were massive obstetric bleeding and complications of severe preeclampsia, which more often occurred during childbirth and the first days of the postpartum period. All patients who survived a near death condition belonged to the group of high obstetric and perinatal risk, but most of them were delivered in obstetric hospitals of the second level, with more than half of the women by caesarean section. We discussed the main ways of preventing and reducing the incidence of critical obstetric conditions and maternal mortality based on the improved modern integral model of internal quality control of medical care in obstetric institutions. We also discussed the findings based on the introduction into practice of medical, organizational and methodological (including telecommunication and other) technologies aimed at increasing professional competencies in the regions of the country. Special attention is drawn in this article to the need to systematize and develop uniform and clear criteria for assessing critical obstetric conditions.