Determinants of maternal mortality in Ghana: A Focus on neighbourhood characteristics and socio-demographic status,

Abstract

The widening disparity in the risk of maternal mortality between developed and developing countries is of considerable concern. In Ghana, there are crucial disparities in the risk of maternal mortality across different regions and communities. This forms the focus of this study: to understand the influence of place of living on the risk of maternal mortality. The analysis showed that the level of deprivation of the neighbourhood within which women lived was very important in explaining the probability of maternal deaths after adjusting for individual factors. The level of deprivation of the neighbourhood had an engulfing effect on residents and suppressed the expected positive effect of educational attainment. The increasing effect of deprivation however reduces when the proportion of women with senior high school education in a neighbourhood increases. Policies that promote educational attainment up to at least the senior high school level for women would be influential in reducing the risk of maternal mortality. Further research on the effect of vulnerable locations on health status is recommended.