Risk for postpartum hemorrhage, transfusion, and hemorrhage-related morbidity at low, moderate, and high volume hospitals

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this study was to characterize risk for and temporal trends in postpartum hemorrhage across hospitals with different delivery volumes.

Study design: This study used the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) to characterize risk for postpartum hemorrhage from 1998 to 2011. Hospitals were classified as having either low, moderate or high delivery volume (≤1000, 1001 to 2000, >2000 deliveries per year, respectively). The primary outcomes included postpartum hemorrhage, transfusion, and related severe maternal morbidity. Adjusted models were created to assess factors associated with hemorrhage and transfusion.

Results: Of 55,140,088 deliveries included for analysis 1,512,212 (2.7%) had a diagnosis of postpartum hemorrhage and 361,081 (0.7%) received transfusion. Risk for morbidity and transfusion increased over the study period, while the rate of hemorrhage was stable ranging from 2.5 to 2.9%. After adjustment, hospital volume was not a major risk factor for transfusion or hemorrhage.

Discussion: While obstetric volume does not appear to be a major risk factor for either transfusion or hemorrhage, given that transfusion and hemorrhage-related maternal morbidity are increasing across hospital volume categories, there is an urgent need to improve obstetrical care for postpartum hemorrhage. Those risk factors are able to discriminate women at increased risk supports routine use of hemorrhage risk assessment.

Keywords:

• Obstetric hemorrhage
• maternal morbidity
• maternal safety

Disclosure statement

The authors did not report any potential conflicts of interest.

Dr. Friedman is supported by a career development award (K08HD082287) from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (K08HD082287), National Institutes of Health.

Additional information

Funding

Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, [10.13039/100000071].