Using ODK to Improve Maternal Care in Ethiopia

Digital Campus is a not for profit company specializing in technology development in emerging countries. For several years, they have been working with Mekelle University (Ethiopia) and are supporting a PhD programme in public health in conjunction with Alcalá University (Spain) and Maastricht University (Netherlands). One of their projects is researching ways in which mobile technologies can help to improve maternal and child health care in rural areas of Ethiopia.

Alex Little, the director of Digital Campus, writes, "We are using ODK for the rural Health Extension Workers (HEWs) to record the visits they make to pregnant mothers. This information can then be used by the HEWs, their supervisors and midwives at the local health centres to help track mothers who are most at risk of developing complications during pregnancy and delivery. Using the data collected through ODK we are in the process of developing a friendly health information system application at community level to help manage and track these at-risk mothers...