Women's Day 2023: WhatsApp chatbots that can help women take control of critical health issues

WhatsApp is primarily used as a messaging platform but the Meta-owned brand is trying to expand into other functions. This Women's Day WhatsApp has highlighted some chatbots offering personalised healthcare solutions, especially for women. Under WhatsApp's Incubator program healthcare providers are building customised solutions to make healthcare accessible for citizens across India, especially in rural areas.

Here's a list of chatbots that women can use for maternal, sexual & reproductive health as well as diabetes management:

ARMMAN's mMitra WhatsApp program

One such program is ARMMAN's mMitra program, which is an IVR-based maternal messaging program that provides personalized reminders and actionable information to pregnant women. The program has expanded to include a WhatsApp chatbot that offers multilingual voice and chat-based communication, making it easier for expectant mothers to access life-saving healthcare information and critical information on maternal and infant care. During the pilot, 87% of the women who set up reminders made their antenatal doctor visits post-reminders.

 WhatsApp users need to simply send ‘Hi’ to the number +912250323237 to access the chatbot

Girl Effect's Bol Behen WhatsApp chatbot 

Girl Effect's Bol Behen chatbot on WhatsApp is designed to help adolescent girls and young women with concerns and queries around general health and sexual well-being. The chatbot is equipped with verified health-service directories and provides gamified learning through quizzes to improve engagement. Over 240,000 users have initiated conversations and over 2.7 million messages have been received on the Bol Behen chatbot.

 Users can simply send ‘Hi’ to the number +917304496601 on WhatsApp to start a conversation. 

Remedo's DISHA WhatsApp chatbot  

Remedo's DISHA chatbot on WhatsApp is a one-stop-shop for PCOS and pregnancy-related information, including adherence to a care plan post-consultation with a doctor and enabling sustainable lifestyle change. The chatbot has been well received, with 90 per cent of patients showing improvement in their condition and sharing a 4.5/5 approval rating during the pilot.

 To access the service, WhatsApp users need to send a ‘Hi’ to the number +918879797976

7SUGAR's gestational diabetes management WhatsApp chatbot

7SUGAR's gestational diabetes management chatbot on WhatsApp is personalizing diabetes monitoring and care for expectant mothers by asking them to upload their meal photos, glucose readings, vitals & symptoms for immediate feedback. This enables the creation of an escalation path for interventions when required. The pilot is underway at three hospitals, and early results show that 65 per cent of patients uploaded at least one glucose reading every day.

WhatsApp users can simply send ‘Hi’ to the number +919606374799 to access the information and services.

Gramvaani's Kahi Ankahi Baatein (KAB) WhatsApp chatbot

Gramvaani's WhatsApp chatbot, Kahi Ankahi Baatein (KAB), offers low-income communities an interactive multilingual service that answers questions on sexual and reproductive health. The chatbot supports busting myths and misconceptions around taboo topics of sex and sexuality and relationships, and users can seek responses to questions they may have in an anonymous manner, not only by text but also through audio recordings built on Natural Language Processing (NLP). During the pilot, 3000+ users onboarded offline within three weeks, and 29 per cent requested more content.

Users can initiate a conversation on the chatbot by sending ‘Hi’ to the number +919266617888 on WhatsApp.

Also read: Meta announces 'AI personas' for Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp