Andy visits the MoTeCH project in Ghana 28/02/2011

Andy recently visited the Upper East Region of Ghana to see the Mobile Technology for Community Health project (MoTeCH) in action. The project was launched in November 2008 to see how mobile phones could be used to improve care for pregnant mothers and newborn babies in rural Ghana. Mobile phones have become a widely used technology in developing countries.

This is a remote region with scattered communities which can make it difficult for community health workers to keep track of the pregnant women and new born children in their area. Using basic mobile phones it is possible to register each pregnancy and each clinic visit. The women receive text messages and voice mails relating to the various stages of their pregnancy and other information relevant to their particular medical history.  Once her child is born, the mother will receive messages and information about essential vaccinations for her child and how to manage critical childhood illnesses.

The service is not just about communicating with the women, it’s also about mobilising the staff. The system sends a weekly message to staff listing any women who have missed appointments, so staff can go to the village and find out what’s happening. This relatively simple information processing makes the whole health system more reliable 

The project is funded by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and run by the Application Laboratory (AppLab) an initiative of the Grameen Foundation. The foundation is a non-profit organisation based in the US which aims to help the world’s poorest people, particularly women, to improve their lives and escape poverty through the use of technology and microfinance.

Andy was visiting Ghana to understand this work and relate it to MOMTECH, a Sheffield Hallam University research project he is involved in which is using text messaging to support women dealing with obesity in pregnancy in Doncaster, South Yorkshire.