Commentary

Every day in the year 2015, about 830 women died of childbirth and pregnancy complications. Almost all these deaths occurred in low resource settings, and most could have been prevented. The primary causes of death were haemorrhage, hypertension and sepsis.1

The last two decades witnessed global efforts, including Public Health, clinical, academic, administrative and socioeconomic, to save lives at birth, worldwide.

In low-income and middle-income countries, the risk of a woman dying of a maternal-related cause during her lifetime is about 33 times higher, compared with a woman living in a developed country. The number of women dying of complications during pregnancy and childbirth has decreased by 43%, from an estimated 532 000 deaths in the year 1990, down to 303 000 deaths in the year 2015, a testimonial that Global collaborative efforts ‘work’.1

Progress was achieved in the management of maternal postpartum haemorrhage (PPH) of vaginal birth and Caesarean section2–7; however, less progress was attained in case of pregnancy-related bacterial sepsis, including puerperal sepsis and postabortion sepsis, particularly unsafe abortion’s intrauterine infection. Sepsis is one of the leading causes of maternal mortality, worldwide.

Introduced in the year 1999, Bakri SOS Tamponade Balloon,4 8–10 was the first uterine tamponade balloon system for the treatment of PPH.4 9 11 Multiple other devices followed, including: condom catheters,12 BT-Cath,13 ESM-UBT (Every Second Matters - Uterine Balloon Tamponade),14 Ebb balloon15 and Zhukovsky balloon.16

Successful outcome (haemorrhage control) without the need …