Mobile Health Technology launched to assist pregnant women, children
Mobile Health Technology (MOTECH), an innovation for people to access information on their health on mobile phones, has been launched at Dawurampong in the Gomoa West in the Central Region.
Advertisement
The partners implementing the technology have developed two services that run on the mobile phone. One of them is the Mobile Midwife, which sends voice messages in local languages to pregnant women and mothers to help them to take care of their pregnancies and the health of their infants.
The other is Nurses’ Application, which will enable nurses to use the mobile phone to enter data on the care they give to patients.
Ms Karen Romano, the Country Director of Grameen Foundation, said the mobile technology for community health was born out of a partnership between the Ghana Health Service, Grameen Foundation, Colombia University, Saving Lives at Birth Initiative, Bill and Belinda Gates Foundation, United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Norway Government, Grand Challenges of Canada and the World Bank.
CHPS facilities
She said the partners identified the need to give women in rural communities more accurate health information and simplify client data managed at the CHPS facilities.
Speaking at the function, Mr Theophilus Aidoo-Mensah, the Gomoa West District Chief Executive, commended the initiators and the funding partners and described the innovation as very useful and added that it was impacting positively on health delivery in the district.
He said MOTECH would help the Ghana Health Service to achieve Millennium Development Goals Four and Five, that relate to reducing infant mortality and improving maternal health respectively, and also assist in data management in the health system.
Funding
She recalled that in 2009, the Bill and Belinda Gates Foundation provided funding to the partners to test ideas on how the mobile phone could be used to improve maternal and child health in Ghana.
Ms Romano said from January, to date, 1,877 pregnant women and 5,831 children under five years had been registered with the MOTECH in Gomoa West.
She said Grameen Foundation was working to assist Gomoa West District Health Management Team (DHMT) to train nurses to use MOTECH.
Dr Yaw Ofori Yeboah, the District Director of Health, said Gomoa West had many health challenges but they needed to pay special attention to pregnant women and children.
He said almost 13 per cent of pregnant women did not attend pre-natal clinic last year; 46 per cent delivered at home and only 50 per cent of women who delivered at home made use of post-natal services.
Dr Yeboah attributed the causes of the challenges to traditional practices and beliefs which encourage pregnant women to seek health care in prayer camps and avoid hospital attendance.
Mr Francis Kojo Arthur, Member of Parliament for Gomoa West, said a plot of land had been acquired for the construction of a polyclinic at Dawurampong.
Obrifo Ahunako Ahor Ankobea 11, the Omanhene of Gomoa Akyempim who chaired the function, spoke against the rise in teenage pregnancies in the district and said “it has rendered the future very bleak.” — GNA