The drug misoprostol provides a safe, convenient, and inexpensive means to prevent postpartum hemorrhage, a major killer of women in developing countries. The study was conducted by researchers from the University of Missouri, India's Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, and the National Institutes of Health.
Postpartum hemorrhage is excessive bleeding experienced by the mother after giving birth. The condition can result from failure of the uterus to contract after detachment of the placenta or from ruptures or tears in the uterus and other tissues.
The study, conducted with women in rural India, appeared in the October 7 Lancet, and was funded by the Global Network for Women's and Children's Health Research, a public-private partnership between NIH's National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The NICHD Global Network for Women's and Children's Health Research supports research based on sound scientific evidence. The Network supports research seeking to improve medical treatments, procedures and preventive measures that will reduce death and disability in women, infants, and children in resource poor-countries. Only interventions which are cost-effective and appropriate for use in developing countries are evaluated by the network. The Global Network pairs U.S. and foreign investigators to increase scientific capacity, research infrastructure, and sustainability.
The study was conducted by researchers in the United States and India. The American team, led by Richard J. Derman, M.D., M.P.H, of the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine, also included Nancy Moss, Ph.D from NICHD. The Indian authors of the study included Bhalchandra S. Kodkany, M.D, and colleagues from the Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Belgaum, Karnataka.
"The researchers showed that giving women misoprostol after birth is a safe, inexpensive means to prevent postpartum hemorrhage fr
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Contact: Robert Bock and Marianne Glass Miller
bockr@mail.nih.gov
301-496-5133
NIH/National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
5-Oct-2006