2017 ICT4D Conference

A 2013 DHS report states Nigeria has a maternal mortality ratio of 576 deaths per 100,000 live births, and 34% of pregnant women reported receiving no antenatal care during pregnancy. The absence of accountability measures in health systems, and perception of the quality of maternal services, have influenced poor utilization of services.

Text2Speak is a Premium SMS service rating system that provides clients the opportunity to constructively provide feedback. The service is integrated with Pathfinder’s facility-based m4Change application and is automatically triggered after a woman has attended ANC. The purpose is to receive qualitative and quantitative insights into users’ perceptions of the access, quality, and reliability of services provided, with the aim to improve services by coordinating with government counterparts.

However, several challenges emerged which threatened the project's success. There were delays in engaging key partners, political transition in government, and poor acceptability amongst the target audience. To identify barriers to participation, Pathfinder monitored visits to the health facilities to conduct sensitization among users, monitored the system dashboard, and conducted phone interviews. Pathfinder discovered that although clients were receiving the SMS, response rate was very low.

Adapting to these challenges has provided valuable insight for Pathfinder’s future interventions, namely that the design and delivery of digital health solutions can only succeed by following an iterative and systematic approach, as recommended by the Principles of Digital Development.

This presentation aims for audience members to learn:
1.How behavior patterns in low-resource settings determine the success of SMS based digital health solutions.
2.Pathfinder’s lessons learned in creating meaningful engagement with the community through SMS polling
3.How to identify and respond to implementation challenges through an iterative process.
4.How to address challenges encountered while deploying digital health solutions.