WHO Recommended Interventions for Improving Maternal and Newborn Health

Overview

Maternal and newborn health-care programmes should include key interventions to improve maternal and newborn health and survival. This pamphlet presents five tables that indicate those key interventions to be delivered through health services, the family and the community.

• Table 1 lists interventions delivered to the mother during pregnancy, childbirth and in the postpartum period, and to the newborn soon after birth.
• Table 2 lists the places where care should be provided through health services, the types of providers required and the recommended interventions and commodities at each level.
• Table 3 lists practices, activities and support needed during pregnancy and childbirth by the family, community and workplace.
• Table 4 lists key interventions provided to women before conception and between pregnancies.
• Table 5 addresses unwanted pregnancies.