**2. Definitions**

Postnatal care (PNC) ensures early assessments for pregnancy danger signs during the postpartum period and is to be provided within 24 hours of birth, 48–72 hours, 7–14 days, and 6 weeks after birth [1]. Therefore, postnatal care services are a fundamental component of the maternal, newborn, and childcare continuum and are key to achieving the sustainable development goals (SDGs) on reproductive, maternal, and child health, including targets to reduce maternal mortality rates and end preventable deaths of newborns [1]. Moreover, in line with the SDGs, postnatal care efforts must expand beyond the optimum coverage by maternal services and survival alone to include quality of care.

Although postnatal care services are a fundamental element of the continuum of essential obstetric care and were implemented to play a role in decreasing maternal and neonatal morbidity and mortality, particularly in low- and middle-income countries still, almost 40% of women experience complications after delivery and an estimated 15% develop potentially life-threatening problems [4–6]. As almost all (99%) of maternal and neonatal deaths occur in developing countries [7], inequality is a prominent matter among high-income and low- and middle-income countries where almost three out of four women had ≥one symptom (73.5%), abnormalities on clinical examination (71.3%), or laboratory investigation (73.5%) after delivery mainly in the postnatal period [8]. Moreover, maternal morbidity was not limited to a core "at-risk" group; only 1.2% of women had a combination of four morbidities.
