Grant: CIHR Fellowship

For most families, pregnancy is a happy time where couples look forward to the birth of a healthy baby. However, pregnancy can put an additional strain on a woman's body and sometimes women experience adverse events such as heart attacks or strokes while they are pregnant. We know that women in certain parts of the country are more or less likely to experience these events; however, we do not know why. This project will use medical information to examine these regional differences and to find out if these differences can be best explained by differences in medical practice or differences in the population of pregnant women. It will look closely at differences in clinical practice and how these differences impact the amount of time women spend in the hospital after these events occur and what proportion of women survive. After determining what areas have the highest rate of survival and shortest length of stay, an intervention will be designed based on the best available clinical evidence that aims to reduce the occurrence of these events.