The Foley Catheter is a safer and more effective adjunctive method of treatment of IUA compared with the IUCD.

Pregnancy outcome was relatively poor because conventional treatments did not cure the most prevalent causes of infertility, and assisted reproductive technology is therefore advocated.

It is presently being debated whether the partograph is a useful tool for labor supervision and, if useful, where should the action line be located between 2, 3 or 4 h to improve the fetomaternal outcome. This review adduces facts to show that this debate is because there is a poor understanding of the essence and purpose of the partograph. The partograph is a form on which labor observations are recorded to provide an overview of labor, aiming to alert midwives and obstetricians to deviations in labor progress as well as maternal and fetal wellbeing. When deviations in labor progress are recognized early and corrected, complications are prevented and normal labor and delivery can occur. The earliest deviation in labor progress is slow labor progress, for which the partograph alert line is a prompt for early recognition by the midwives and other non-obstetric staff. The intervention to correct the deviation is at the action line by the staff with the requisite skill. In the circumstance in which the partogram was produced, the action to correct the deviation in labor progress was after 4 h, represented by the 4-h action line, but other workers have attempted with 2- and 3-h action lines and have had equally good results. However, in all these, the action at the action line was instituted by the staff with the appropriate skill, irrespective of whether the action line was 2, 3 or 4 h. As long as the action at the action line is by the staff with the requisite training, the deviation in labor progress will be corrected by either medical or surgical means irrespective of the action line location at 2, 3 or 4 h. In conclusion, the essence and purpose of the partograph is to ensure that labor progress is monitored to identify slow labor by the alert line but appropriate treatment must begin at the action line by the staff with the cognate skill, whether at 2, 3 or 4 h. The appropriateness of the intervention at the action line is the determinant of the outcome and not the delay.

In a 13-year review of maternal deaths at the University of Benin Teaching Hospital, Benin City, abortion was one of the three major causes of death, accounting for 37 (22.4%) out of the 165 deaths. Induced abortion was responsible for 34 (91.9%) of these deaths. The usual victim is the teenage, inexperienced school girl who has no ready access to contraceptive practice. Death was mainly due to sepsis (including tetanus), hemorrhage and trauma to vital organs, complications directly attributable to faulty techniques by unskilled abortion providers, a by-product of the present restrictive abortion laws. Total overhaul of maternal child health services and the family health education system, as well as integration of planned parenthood at primary health care level into the health care delivery system, are suggested. Contraceptive practice should be made available to all categories of women at risk, and the cost subsidised by governmental and institutional bodies. Where unwanted pregnancies occur, the authors advocate termination in appropriate health institutions where lethal and sometimes fatal complications are unlikely to occur. In effect, from the results of this study and a review of studies on abortion deaths in Nigeria and other developing countries, it is obvious that a revision of abortion laws as they operate, notably in the African continent, is overdue.

Successfully conducting an assisted reproduction program at a public health facility is feasible in a low-resource country. Treating couples in batches was cost effective, with a low complication rate.