ARMMAN, a Mumbai based nonprofit organisation, is leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance adherence in maternal and child health programmes. Initiated in 2020, the project with Google Research India and IIT Madras uses AI to predict the risk of women dropping out of healthcare programmes such as mMitra. Along with scientific collaboration, the project was supported with funding from Google Research and Google.org. 

With Google's support, a project was launched to increase adherence to mMitra, with an overall goal of improving maternal and child health outcomes. Researchers from Google Research and IIT Madras have been working with ARMMAN to design an AI technology solution that could provide an indication of women who were at the risk of dropping out from mMitra.

The early targeted identification helps ARMMAN to personalise interventions for an improved engagement with mMitra. Test results indicate a reduction in the risk of drop-offs by up to 32 per cent for women at high risk of dropping out. So far, mMitra has reached over 2.3 million women in India and is 1 of only 5 scaled mobile-based maternal messaging programmes in the world.

"We see an immense potential to replicate these learnings from AI across other technology enabled at-scale programs implemented by ARMMAN," shared Ramesh Padmanabhan, CEO, ARMMAN. 

Milind Tambe, Director - AI for Social Good, Google Research India, added, "ARMMAN has made tremendous strides on the project with IIT Madras and Google to apply AI to help improve preventive care for mothers and children.”

Google Research and ARMMAN are currently working towards scaling this to 300,000+ mothers and children in mMitra, with a goal of eventually reaching 1 million mothers and children. 

In partnership with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), ARMMAN is currently implementing the largest mobile-based maternal messaging program (Kilkari) and the largest mobile-based training program for frontline health workers  (Mobile Academy). The largest programs of their kind across the world, Kilkari has reached 21 million women and children while Mobile Academy has trained 166,000 frontline health workers in 13 states of India.