KenyaHealthcare and life sciences2019 – ongoingJacaranda Health
PROMPTS AI-assisted maternal health helpdesk
Jacaranda Health's PROMPTS sends about 7% of messages directly to nurses, with 18 nurses monitoring the system around the clock
Problem
Kenyan mothers in public clinics had questions about pregnancy and newborn care but little access to staff between visits. Danger signs can be missed when messages pile up.
Approach
The nonprofit set up PROMPTS in 2017 as an SMS service and added AI in 2019 to sort messages by urgency. A Kiswahili health language model, UlizaLlama, was finished in 2024 and answers routine questions. Messages that show danger signs go to staff, and 18 nurses monitor, audit and answer questions around the clock. The service works in English, Swahili and Sheng and has spread to Ghana, Nigeria and Tanzania.
Results
Takeaway
Jacaranda estimates the program still errs in about 30% of cases, so human review stays and adds cost. Experts quoted by NPR said such tools work best where health systems already function.
Categories
- Industry
- Healthcare and life sciences
- Business function
- Customer serviceProduction and quality
- Innovation type
- Product and service innovationProcess innovation
- Adoption
- Built in-house
- Evidence
- Press reporting
Sources
Source summaries
NPR reports PROMPTS runs in 24 Kenyan counties, with daily questions growing from under 100 to about 15,000. Eighteen nurses monitor the system, about 7% of messages go straight to a nurse, and upkeep costs about $2 per user, paid by the nonprofit. Experts warned that the system could misclassify an urgent message.
IDRC, a funder of PROMPTS, reports that the service started in 2017 and added the UlizaLlama model in 2024. It reports 650,000 mothers registered in 2024 and 4,000 to 15,000 messages a day. Jacaranda estimates errors in about 30% of cases, and a human takes over when a mother is unhappy with an automated reply.
Full details are in the original sources.
