The objectives are as follows: To identify, synthesise and evaluate the effects of health system and other interventions aimed at improving maternal, newborn and women's reproductive health in crisis settings.

Worldwide, humanitarian crises impact significantly on public health, health infrastructure and the delivery of health care (WHO 2012). A humanitarian crisis can be understood as '...a situation in which there is an exceptional and generalized threat to human life, health or subsistence. These crises usually appear within the context of an existing situation of a lack of protection where a series of pre‐existent factors (poverty, inequality, lack of access to basic services) exacerbated by a natural disaster or armed conflict, multiply the destructive effects' (Francesch 2010). Humanitarian crises are generally grouped into the following three categories: 

• natural disasters (e.g. earthquakes, floods, storms and volcanic eruptions);
• man‐made disasters (e.g. conflicts, plane and train crashes, fires and industrial accidents); and 
• complex emergencies (Humanitarian Coalition)