Besides basic healthcare infrastructure, Somali women also lack pregnancy awareness and access to local midwives. This is amplified when women living in the Somali rural landscape are considered. This points towards a general lack of awareness in the Somali rural areas. Most of their information regarding pregnancies is passed down from mother to daughter which means that information has never been medically corroborated. Even if there is a midwife present nearby, the women are unable to travel either because they barely have access to any means of transportation or they cannot afford it. Somali women are unaware of a critical reality that prenatal care requires frequent visits to the midwife or the doctor.
The aim was to cater to the underprivileged pregnant Somali women and provide them with the necessary prenatal guidance.
Through discussions with the team and the client, we brainstormed and decided that a Proof of Concept (POC) for a Chat-bot integrated on WhatsApp would be the most optimal way to cater to the problem. One important aspect to consider was their limited exposure to technology, so only a POC would be developed right now. It was also through these brainstorming sessions that the idea of a midwife remotely monitoring the patients was also put forward.
A principal element to work around was what would the chat-bot ask the patients? A detailed chat-flow was created based on questions about the symptoms and their possible answers. The chat-flow and questions were mainly divided into trimester periods of the pregnancy and had questions based on the symptoms relating each trimester. We also configured a database (to store patient information) and a dashboard (to be accessed by the midwife).
Iterating the project meant we thoroughly tested the chat-flows till the process was seamless and could work towards our aim- being a guide to the underprivileged pregnant women of Somalia.
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A POC for a WhatsApp integrated chatbot which can converse with pregnant Somali women. It will provide them with prenatal care by asking questions about their present symptoms. A midwife will access their information and remotely monitor the pregnancies to see which one might need immediate attention.
We turned it into a value-added solution by enabling the chatbot to categorize the pregnancies in high-risk or no-risk categories based on the answers provided by the women and store their information in a database. High-risk symptoms include anemia, bleeding, preeclampsia and infections.
After the implementation, a midwife will have remote access to the information stored in the database to see if any pregnancy has been categorized as high-risk, so she can notify the patients to take necessary precautions, even if it means a physical visit to the midwife.
Besides basic healthcare infrastructure, Somali women also lack pregnancy awareness and access to local midwives. This is amplified when women living in the Somali rural landscape are considered. This points towards a general lack of awareness in the Somali rural areas. Most of their information regarding pregnancies is passed down from mother to daughter which means that information has never been medically corroborated. Even if there is a midwife present nearby, the women are unable to travel either because they barely have access to any means of transportation or they cannot afford it. Somali women are unaware of a critical reality that prenatal care requires frequent visits to the midwife or the doctor.
The aim was to cater to the underprivileged pregnant Somali women and provide them with the necessary prenatal guidance.
Besides basic healthcare infrastructure, Somali women also lack pregnancy awareness and access to local midwives. This is amplified when women living in the Somali rural landscape are considered. This points towards a general lack of awareness in the Somali rural areas. Most of their information regarding pregnancies is passed down from mother to daughter which means that information has never been medically corroborated. Even if there is a midwife present nearby, the women are unable to travel either because they barely have access to any means of transportation or they cannot afford it. Somali women are unaware of a critical reality that prenatal care requires frequent visits to the midwife or the doctor.
The aim was to cater to the underprivileged pregnant Somali women and provide them with the necessary prenatal guidance.
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Besides basic healthcare infrastructure, Somali women also lack pregnancy awareness and access to local midwives. This is amplified when women living in the Somali rural landscape are considered. This points towards a general lack of awareness in the Somali rural areas. Most of their information regarding pregnancies is passed down from mother to daughter which means that information has never been medically corroborated. Even if there is a midwife present nearby, the women are unable to travel either because they barely have access to any means of transportation or they cannot afford it. Somali women are unaware of a critical reality that prenatal care requires frequent visits to the midwife or the doctor.
The aim was to cater to the underprivileged pregnant Somali women and provide them with the necessary prenatal guidance.
