The Global Maternal and Newborn Health Platform: study protocol for an observational, multi-country study on the quality of intrapartum and early postnatal care at health facilities

Background: Good-quality care in the intrapartum and early postnatal period are critical to ensuring maternal, fetal and newborn survival and well-being. There is currently no standardised approach to assess the quality of intrapartum and early postnatal care provided in health facilities, women’s experiences of that care, and whether the services provided are aligned with the latest WHO recommendations. The Global Maternal and Newborn Health Platform (GMP) aims to establish and sustain a multi-country network of health facilities providing childbirth services, to measure and improve the quality of intrapartum and early postnatal care. The main objectives of this Platform are (i) to measure coverage of key intrapartum and early postnatal care practices and their alignment with WHO recommendations, (ii) to describe women’s experiences of care, (iii) to measure key maternal and newborn health outcomes. Methods: GMP will use periodic, cross-sectional, observational data collection in a multi-country network of health facilities from up to 63 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). In the first wave, GMP is being implemented in 74 facilities in 10 Asia-Pacific countries. In participating facilities data will be collected at level of the individual woman/baby, maternal and newborn health providers, and facility. Discussion: This multi-country initiative aims to assess the quality of intrapartum and early postnatal care in health facilities, with a “person-centred” approach that emphasizes women’s experiences during birth and postnatal admission. In its first wave, data will be collected from over 100,000 women and their babies, alongside nearly 30,000 pre-discharge surveys on care experiences, complemented by responses from over 2,000 healthcare providers across 74 facilities in 10 Asia-Pacific countries. The resulting dataset will enable multi-country, country-specific, and facility-level analyses to identify actionable priorities for improving maternal and newborn health outcomes. GMP’s tools and methods are developed using an evidence-based approach and foster multidisciplinary networks among healthcare professionals, researchers, and policymakers. GMP provides a robust, scalable approach for periodic and standardised data collection, informing evidence-based policy and practice to enhance care quality. GMP will provide global situational analyses on intrapartum and early postnatal care quality to address the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and will help to addresses the WHA 77.5 resolution to accelerate progress towards reducing maternal, newborn and child mortality, including stillbirths.