Maternale Mortalität – Deutschland im Vergleich

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a woman died from issues related to pregnancy and birth every 2 min in the year 2020. Despite a global reduction in maternal mortality rates (MMR, maternal deaths/100,000 live births) worldwide by 34% between 2000 and 2020, the United Nations millennium goal remains unfulfilled. The official MMR in Germany for 2020 is 4.4 which is relatively low compared to other nations; however, the question arises whether all deaths have been sufficiently captured and analyzed.

Two published studies conducted by our research group, analyzing the maternal mortality in the federal state of Berlin are reviewed in this article.

Only 26.8% of the official death certificates were adequately completed in items relevant for this analysis. Nonetheless, an additional investigation uncovered 14 maternal deaths within the period from 2019 to 2021. Considering these additional cases, the actual MMR was 9.1 as opposed to 3.9 as officially reported via the perinatal statistics.

Germany lacks an official cataloguing system for the complete registration of maternal deaths. This therefore results in the lack of a systematic confidential review process that would aid in the development of preventive strategies. The introduction of the “GeMoRe” registry in 2024 aims to facilitate a comprehensive cataloguing system and analysis of maternal deaths in the federal state of Berlin.