Use of mHealth in promoting maternal and child health in ‘BIMARU’ states of India “A health system strengthening strategy”: Systematic Literature Review

Singh, K. and Walters, M. (2024) Use of mHealth in promoting maternal and child health in ‘BIMARU’ states of India “A health system strengthening strategy”: Systematic Literature Review. PLoS Digital Health, 3(2), e0000403. (doi: 10.1371/journal.pdig.0000403) (PMID:38306391) (PMCID:PMC10836675)

Abstract

Low-middle income countries like India bear a heavier burden of maternal, childcare, and child mortality rates when compared with high-income countries, which highlights the disparity in global health. Numerous societal, geopolitical, economic, and institutional issues have been linked to this inequality. mHealth has the potential to ameliorate these challenges by providing health services and health-related information with the assistance of frontline workers in the provision of prepartum, delivery, and postnatal care to improve maternal and child health outcomes in hard-to-reach areas in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, there is limited evidence to support how mHealth can strengthen maternal and child health in India. The scoping review guideline in the Cochrane Handbook was used to retrieve studies from 4 international databases: CINAHL, Embase, Medline Ovid, and PubMed. This search strategy used combined keywords (MeSH terms) related to maternal and child healthcare, mHealth, and BIMARU in conjunction with database-controlled vocabulary. Out of 278 records, 8 publications were included in the review. The included articles used mHealth for data collection, eLearning, communication, patient monitoring, or tracking to deliver maternal and neonatal care. The results of these papers reflected a favourable effect of mHealth on the target population and found that it altered their attitudes and behaviours about healthcare. Higher job satisfaction and self-efficiency were reported by mHealth user care providers. Multiple barriers to the acceptance of mHealth exist, but the majority of the evidence points towards the feasibility of the intervention in a clinical setting. The mHealth has positive potential for improving maternal and child health outcomes in low-resource settings in India’s BIMARU states by strengthening the healthcare system. The results of the study could be used in the tailoring of an effective mHealth intervention and implementation strategy in a similar context. However, there is a need for economic evaluation in the future to bridge the knowledge gap regarding the cost-effectiveness of mHealth interventions.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Walters, Professor Matthew

Creator Roles

Walters, M.: Funding acquisition, Project administration, Supervision, Validation, Writing – review and editing

• Authors: Singh, K., and Walters, M.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Life Sciences
• Journal Name: PLoS Digital Health
• Publisher: Public Library of Science
• ISSN: 2767-3170
• ISSN (Online): 2767-3170
• Copyright Holders: Copyright: © 2024 Singh, Walters
• First Published: First published in PLoS Digital Health 3(2): e0000403
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons licence