Every day, two or three women die because of pregnancy or childbirth. Nearly 80% of these deaths are preventable. These outcomes disproportionately impact racialized populations, including Black and Indigenous women, who are two to three times more likely to die. The Practical Playbook III: Working Together to Improve Maternal Health is a guide for maternal health stakeholders (like researchers, community activists, providers, and advocates) offering practical tools and strategies to address inequities in maternal health services and outcomes. With contributions from more than 150 authors, each chapter offers a different strategy that stakeholders can apply to improve maternal health in their community. The 50 chapters are divided into six main sections: Section I, Introduction
Section II, Collaborations
Section III, Equity
Section IV, Data
Section V, Innovations
and Section VI, Systems and Scalability. The chapters focus on ways to save mothers by centering equity, collaborating with people with lived experience, building better data systems, piloting and expanding innovations, and leveraging resources to scale and sustain what works. Throughout the book, readers encounter stories from women and birthing people that bring the problems and solutions into better focus. The editors are committed to continuing to share information about initiatives that are moving the needle through our online platforms.