m-mama
Reducing maternal mortality and saving lives through affordable emergency transport.
Locations:
Every pregnant woman and new mother has the right to quality care
Thousands of pregnant women in rural areas of Africa are unable to travel to hospital in a pregnancy-related emergency and rates of maternal and newborn deaths remain stubbornly high.
m-mama is reversing this trend and saving lives by using mobile technology to connect pregnant women to emergency transport when they need it the most.
The service is particularly crucial in rural areas, where hospitals are often hours away and infrastructure can be limited.
How it works
Women or their health workers call a toll-free number to connect with a trained dispatcher.
The dispatcher uses the m-mama app to quickly triage a patient, identify the closest appropriate healthcare facility, and locate the nearest available emergency transport.
When ambulances are unavailable, there is a network of community drivers who can provide transport.
m-mama is free for women at the point of access, and drivers are paid for the journey by the government via M-Pesa (Vodacom's mobile money transfer system) or other approved mechanisms.
m-mama intentionally uses cheap, basic technology, and the m-mama app is designed for use online and offline, making it ideal for rural areas.
A government owned, affordable service
m-mama was born from a shared determination between Vodafone Foundation and the governments in Tanzania and Lesotho to address maternal health.
From day one, m-mama was developed with complete government operation in mind. Designed to be fully integrated into national healthcare systems and budgets, when m-mama reached national scale in Tanzania and Lesotho, both governments were able to take over 100% running costs and ownership of the programme.
It is designed to be cost efficient too. For example, the full cost of the programme to the Lesotho government is USD 120,000 annually, which is less than the cost of one ambulance.
Impact
Over
142,000
emergency transports
Nearly
5,800
mother and baby lives saved
In Tanzania, 58% of mothers transported by m-mama received emergency C-sections, with an estimated 15% reduction in maternal deaths, and a 30% reduction in cost per ambulance trip.
The availability and accessibility of emergency transportation through m-mama has led to a 107% increase in maternal and a 97% increase in neonatal incidents handled by health facilities. This reflects success in improving access to healthcare rather than just an increase in the number of deliveries
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