This is a list of notable women, either famous themselves or closely associated with someone well known, who suffered maternal death as defined by the World Health Organization (WHO): Note that this wording includes abortion, miscarriage, stillbirth, and ectopic pregnancy.
Generally, there is a distinction between a direct maternal death that is the result of a complication of the pregnancy, delivery, or management of the two, and an indirect maternal death that is a pregnancy-related death in a woman with a pre-existing or newly developed health problem unrelated to pregnancy.
Fatalities during but unrelated to a pregnancy are termed accidental, incidental, or non-obstetrical maternal deaths.
Cases with "incidental causes" include deaths secondary to violence against women that may be related to the pregnancy and be affected by the socioeconomic and cultural environment.
]that about 10% of maternal deaths may occur late, that is after 42 days after a termination or delivery; thus, some definitions extend the period of observation to one year after the end of gestation.