- Maternal is stroke is very devastating, but it is a rare event. It happens about 30 per 100,000 deliveries, is approximately the rate that has been shown in prior studies and this study actually corroborated that. So it's rare, but there are certain groups of women that are at higher risk than that and the highest risk group is really women with high blood pressure and so that just has to be taken into account and I wonder if Black women are getting the same kind of treatment or the same level of attention when they do present with high blood pressure.