2014 Business Action on Health Awards (Commended): Accenture, Amref Health Africa & Vodafone

COMMENDED: Accenture, Amref and Vodafone

Program: Health Enablement & Learning Platform (HELP)

Untitled-1

 
About the Community Investment Program: In 2012, in an innovative, cross-sectoral partnership Amref health Africa, Accenture and Vodafone (through Safaricom & Mezzanine), working closely with the Ministry of Health, teamed up in Kenya to develop the Health Enablement & Learning Platform (HELP). HELP supports Community Health Workers by providing continuous personalized training and productivity tools direct to the phone in their pockets. CHWs play a vital role providing frontline health care. They are chosen by their community and so hold a respected position within that community, and provide education and basic healthcare to their community. The training content is delivered through SMS and IVR, intelligently controlled with an advanced scheduling system following a tailored mLearning pedagogy which defines multiple interactions and learning approaches. Progress is measured using randomized quizzes and automated reports keeping CHWs and supervisors informed and ontrack. Group chat functionality allows collaboration within community units.In May 2014 we completed a 10 month pilot, successfully rolling HELP out to 318 CHWs in three regions across Kenya. 215k SMSs and 140k minutes of IVR audio were delivered to CHWs, and 8,500 health-related group chat messages were sent. 75% of CHWs fully completed all 9 training topics with an average quiz score of 80% and an overall satisfaction rating of 4.7 out of 5. After 4 months, the retention level was 12% higher in the mLearning pilot groups. Critical Success Factors

  • Leveraged tools people already have today (to achieve scale, to avoid literacy issues, to sustain through ownership (i.e. breakage/ theft/ loss))
  • Aligned with Ministry of Health from the start to ensure national support (leveraging the national curriculum), to align with other partners/implementers to encourage collaboration to get to scale and build the business case
  • Our partnership is built on openness, honesty and transparency; it was critical to work with all partners to understand their true agendas in the partnership and to evolve it at different points along the journey