Evaluation of the benefit of setting up a decentralised obstetric-surgical structure in order to reduce maternal mortality and transfers in the Ivory Coast.

Our purpose is to study the way to reduce maternal mortality when introducing a structured obstetric and surgical center to a community previously without such a center. The study was done in Ivory Coast, where such a structure was set up in 1982 in a rural hospital at Divo. It has been observed that with such a structure there are no more transfers of women from Divo to the teaching hospital at Cocody, and a reduction in maternal mortality at Divo. This observation regarding the value of bringing obstetric services to communities currently without them could be a way among those available to reduce maternal mortality in a developing country such as the Ivory Coast.