The contribution of research results to dramatic improvements in post-abortion care: Centre Hospitalier de Libreville, Gabon.

In 2009, we published an article in RHM showing a large delay in provision of emergency obstetric care to women who died from unsafe abortion complications at the Centre Hospitalier de Libreville. The paper raised awareness among hospital and government authorities of a serious delay in timely treatment, and they supported the recommendation of the hospital's Maternal Mortality Committee to greatly reduce the delay and also improve the care of women with abortion complications. Training in manual vacuum aspiration (MVA) for uterine evacuation was introduced, for use by midwives as well as obstetrician-gynaecologists, with local anaesthesia.