PROMPTS

Empowering mothers to seek care at the right place and time

Challenge we’re addressing

A digital health solution to address delays in care seeking.

A key driver of maternal deaths is that mothers are not empowered or informed to seek care at the appropriate time. In Kenya, delays in care seeking contribute to a third of all maternal deaths in the country. Empowering women with knowledge is critical; 91% of women would seek care if they knew and recognized pregnancy and postpartum danger signs.

Our Model

How this works

PROMPTS is an AI-enabled digital health service that, through two-way SMS exchange, empowers women to seek care at the right time and place, and gives them greater agency in the health system. The platform improves care-seeking behaviour by sending mothers SMS messages tracked to their stage of pregnancy, alongside an AI-enabled helpdesk service that triages and responds to mothers’ questions, and sparks a rapid referral chain if a risk is identified.

Snapshot of Scale and Impact

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new and expecting mothers enrolled to PROMPTS

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increase in mothers attending 4+ prenatal care visits

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increase in uptake of postpartum family planning services

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of high-risk mothers flagged by PROMPTS get care at the hospital

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of PROMPTS mothers exclusively breastfeed for the first six months after delivery

A suite of digital tools

that supports mothers to seek care and amplifies their voices to improve its quality.

A sequence of messages

tracked to a mother’s stage of pregnancy influencing key behaviors linked with better outcomes, like pre and postnatal care attendance, and uptake of postpartum family planning services.

An AI-enabled
clinical help desk

that reads, triages, and responds to mothers’ questions, and sparks a rapid referral chain if a risk is identified during the exchange.

A comprehensive
data infrastructure

that collects and aggregates data from mothers to help our facility and government partners improve the quality of maternal services and systems.

More Data

PROMPTS is designed to be scaled and sustained within government health systems.

From the beginning, we designed PROMPTS to have low unit costs so that it can sustainably scale and integrate within government work plans and budgets as a pathway to long-term sustainability. Kenyan county governments are increasingly contributing towards the platform’s running costs, and we work with other partners – like local telecoms – to achieve economies of scale as we grow. The platform is built with and for mothers to advance equity, uptake and adoption, and relies on locally-developed technology that scales and adapts easily to new contexts and languages with minimal enhancements.

Free for Mothers

Users sign up to PROMPTS for free in public health facilities

Low unit costs

$0.74 lifetime cost of a mother on PROMPTS

Affordable for Governments

15% of PROMPTS operating costs are covered by Kenyan county governments

Scaleable to New Contexts

3 partnerships with National Ministries of Health to scale PROMPTS

Stories
from the field

Violet’s story

When Violet arrived home with her new baby, Pendo, she began to lose confidence. She could feel the days becoming more and more of a challenge, and finally reached out – anonymously – to PROMPTS for support. She was surprised how quickly support came – first with a message asking if she’d like further follow-up, and then through a call with a local counseling service specializing in postpartum depression.

violet’s story

Stories
from the field

esther’s story

When Esther gave birth to a baby boy, the first few days were overwhelming. As a single parent, she saw the coming unsupported months as a challenge. When she signed up for PROMPTS at her local clinic, the SMS messages she received quickly became a lifeline; advising her on the practical ‘how-to’ and when of breastfeeding, and encouraging her to stick with only breastmilk for the first six months. At the six month mark, her little boy was growing healthily.

esther’s story

Stories
from the field

faith’s story

Nine weeks into pregnancy, Faith noticed dark red spots of blood. Her husband sent a message to PROMPTS; ‘There’s a lot of blood. What do we do?’. Minutes later, Faith’s husband was connected to a clinical helpdesk agent, who advised rapid referral to hospital. Faith’s miscarriage was far from the outcome that she’d hoped for but, critically, it took place within a safe, clean, and dignified environment with skilled nurses on hand.

faith’s story