Oxytocin: Inhalable childbirth drug could save more than 100,000 women's lives.

An inhalable version of the drug oxytocin could slash the number of women dying in childbirth, researchers say.

About 300,000 women die from childbirth a year, primarily from postpartum haemorrhaging (PPH) and in developing countries such as Afghanistan.

Oxytocin is currently an injectable drug administered to women experiencing signs of PPH in pregnancy, and works by stimulating the uterine muscles.

Associate professor Michelle McIntosh, from the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, has developed the first human trial to deliver the drug in an inhaled form.

“At the end of childbirth the uterus is just tired and it sort of stops contracting, so just an injection or an extra dose of oxytocin, it just prompts that contractility to start again,” Dr McIntosh said.

However in its current form it needs to be refrigerated and a skilled medical professional to properly administer it.

“And that’s not really suitable for a lot of remote or rural locations, particularly in low-resource settings,” Dr McIntosh said.

“Women are going to give birth late at night, there’s no lights, there’s no electricity, there’s nobody there to help.”

She said the drug needed to be able to be administered in a simple way, so that any healthcare worker or community-based healthcare worker could assist a woman immediately after childbirth.

The trial was sponsored by pharmaceutical company GSK and Dr McIntosh said while they hoped to develop the drug for Australian users, their main aim was to make it available to women in developing countries.

“It’s possible over 146,000 women’s lives could be saved during childbirth,” she said.

“And that doesn’t again take into account the impact on children and their health and wellbeing.”

‘I thought, I could die here’

Melbourne woman Natalie experienced postpartum haemorrhaging with her second child.

“I started to feel faint, and there was a number of nurses and doctors in the room and I said, ‘I think I’m going to pass out’,” she said.

“And they laid me down flat, and there’s parts I can’t remember because I wasn’t really that conscious.

“I sort of had an inkling that something really bad was happening.

“You sort of reach this calm state and I thought, ‘I could possibly die here’.”

While Natalie was given oxytocin, having an inhalable version could have prevented the extent of the haemorrhaging.

This post originally appeared on ABC News.