ALLO MOMS

Urban low-income MOMS do not know where to turn to when they have an early health-related issue. 

In African cities, late hospital presentations are a silent killer. On the other hand, 94% of African internet users (over 450 million) use heavily messaging apps. 

We have built a Facebook channel and WhatsApp channel that allows moms and women to access existing local community resources they need to stay healthy. We make it easy for moms to speak to a doctor online for free, find affordable and welcoming hospitals, affordable hygiene products and baby supplies, and much more.

Late hospital presentations is a silent killer for African dwellers, especially women and mothers in Africa. It is hardly quantifiable since no major study has been undertaken, nevertheless is highly acknowledged by the medical profession in African cities as a cause for significant morbidity and mortality.

Women visit hospitals too late or infrequently for many reasons: stigma attached to explaining a health condition, affordability to pay for a doctor visit, poor quality care (waiting time in public hospitals exceeds 4 hours in Cote d'Ivoire which means a day of income forgone and poor treatment by hospital staff).

1.9 billion women in low and middle-income countries own their own phones. 94% use messaging apps, making them a new formidable tool for maternal health.

ALLO makes it easy for low-income women/new mothers to find and access community resources to remain healthy: they can book affordable doctor visits, find affordable hygiene products/baby supplies, participate in mom's group activities through Facebook messenger/WhatsApp and pay for these through dedicated mobile money codes.

We started with a single service: assist low income mothers with booking doctor visits at affordable and welcoming hospitals. 

On our messenger/WhatsApp channels, a mother can chat or make a voice note for free with a doctor to explain her condition — someone to turn to and removing the stigma with anonymous conversation. If the condition explained requires a hospital visit, she chooses date/time and use her phone to pay via dedicated mobile money codes. The mother receives SMS (reservation number) which she presents at hospital, and so our reservation system prevents excessive wait time. 

We have partnered with a growing network of affordable hospitals in Abidjan (the doctor visit is less than 4 dollars compared with 26 dollars) and provided them with a tech platform to accept our bookings. We have performed 2,600 doctor chats and facilitated 518 doctor visits so far. 

Beyond this, our messaging apps channels will accommodate the new services mentioned above.

The idea came from my partner pregnancy and the difficulties witnessed as an uninsured family. 

In Cote d'Ivoire, every year there are more than 700,000 pregnancies while the poverty rate is 46%. 

The team at ALLO engaged with 62 women through focus group interviews, shared a survey with our community of now 37,000 members and continuously receiving doctor feedback from the free chats with women.

Our solution significantly lowers the barriers to seeking care by assisting low income mothers to seek no-stigma-attached, initial help through a free online doctor chat; book affordable doctor visits (easier discovery of proximity affordable hospitals for newly pregnant mothers) and we are expanding our solution as a platform to easily find and access community resources linked to healthcare with a planned facebook bot. 

In 10 months, we have performed 2,600 doctor chats and facilitated 518 doctor visits so far, thus clearly addressing a need.

ALLO was created to help LOW INCOME women and new mothers in African cities find and access existing resources in their city to receive quality, affordable care. 

We make discoverability far easier and provide the tools to access these services by combining messaging apps, mobile money payment codes and back-office software. 

ALLO leverages messaging apps to transform maternal health in Africa. 

Although some solutions use messsaging apps for maternal health outside of Cote d'Ivoire (e.g Grace Health in Ghana), they limit themselves with access to information (receiving health tips, tracking fertility...). 

We have extended the value proposition of our approach to be an end-to-end solution that integrates discovery and access of local healthcare resources beyond information access (through messaging apps), payment (dedicated mobile money codes) and tech provided to hospitals or tech providers (back-office software). 

The bundle of technology is the following:

- A WhatsApp Business account and Facebook messenger via a Facebook page. We use a chat management tool to distribute conversations between our doctors (free doctor chats) and staff (questions on asking for local resources).

- Mobile money allows people to store, spend and send money using a mobile phone. We have worked with a local payment provider that has made  dedicated short codes for payment available. Say Mary needs to book a doctor visit, she will dial #144*2*2*AMOUNT# (low income women even have the ability to make a payment plan to save for the next visit or postnatal visit. She receives a SMS (reservation number) that she presents at the hospital. A similar system can apply for healthcare services at the point of site. 

- We have developed and made available to hospital partners (and to providers) a back-office software platform that allows them to enter visit times, verify reservations numbers and more functions.

Nicole writes or voice note to us through our WhatsApp or facebook messenger channels.

Nicole can ask for existing local resources linked to a particular health service or can speak to a doctor to share a condition.

Nicole receives the information or if she speaks to a doctor, the doctor either offers advice or determines she needs a doctor visits. The doctor leaves the chat, and a staff member takes over. He suggests the nearby affordable hospital and offers Nicole 3 available dates. Nicole picks the date and then pays the doctor visit ahead through a mobile money code. 

Nicole receives her reservation number by SMS and on the due date and hour, she is at the hospital. The hospital desk verifies through the provided backend platform the reservation number and Nicole proceeds to the doctor visit. 

Nicole can engage with our platform as many times as she feels to.

We help low income women and mothers find and access local healthcare resources to stay healthy. We reduce stigma to ask, late and infrequent hospital presentations by leveraging the power of messaging apps and mobile money. 

Current number of people we’re serving: 2600

Number you’ll be serving in one year: 50,000

Number you’ll be serving in five years: 2,000,000

In 5 years, we aim to help 2,000,000 women and mothers find and access community resources for affordable and quality care. 

We will scale up through geographical expansion of our service (targeting Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia). We will use network effects and our marketing ability to reach new beneficiaries.

Financial capacity to expand and scale up

Navigating legal restrictions in expanding to new geographies: these restrictions may add GDPR burden, limit the services we can offer but from our understanding of the legal environment in the countries we currently operate in or target, will not shutdown our service.

Financial capacity to expand and scale up: so far, we have raised 40,000 euros which allowed us to operate. We plan to keep fundraising a combination of patient capital and grants.

Navigating legal restrictions in expanding to new geographies: we will adapt our service according to each country legal framework and budget the amount necessary for this. We will also advocate for change where necessary. In Cote d'Ivoire for example, we are creating the "Abidjan Healthy City" bi-monthly dinner where we invite key policymakers and the health tech community to build understanding and engage. Our first dinner is scheduled in August.

Not applicable

Full time staff: 4

Contractor: 3

Our team includes social entrepreneur Richard Seshie (Orange African Social Entrepreneur of the Year, Ashoka fellow, Silicon Valley trained at Draper University and an MBA candidate with a specialization in Data Analytics at Quantic School of Business & Technology USA); Kanon Gbocho M.D (a certified state doctor and the lead doctor advisor of our facebook doctor chat service); Lorene Ekra (Bachelor in Business Administration with a concentration in Marketing from the top-ranked Ivorian International University of Grand-Bassam, communications specialist) and our advisor Paule Aurore Koffi (MSc. in Entrepreneurship & Innovation Management UNNC-China, BBA in Business Economics Georgia State University -Atlanta, USA and a management executive at the International University of Grand-Bassam).

- 2 hospitals with affordable pricing where our beneficiaries can consult.

- Grant recipient of the Amplify Change Fund UK and the Merieux Foundation France, using this funding to deploy our operations

Revenue is/will be generated from:

• Earning an average of 1 $ for each doctor appointment booking 

• Earning 15% of commission for other services, disocunted feminine hygiene and personal care products accessed through our service

Primarily selling our services to make a breakeven and a margin in the mid to long term.

We intend to raise patient capital and secure donations/grants through specific initiatives built around ALLO offering.

We are applying to SOLVE to build partnership opportunities that can be instrumental in moving the needle for us, and for possible financial support

Refining our business model and fundraising strategy

Advice on solution technology

Advice on navigating legal/regulatory matters when expanding 

Hosting USA based interns to Cote d'Ivoire

We are open for partnerships with MIT initiatives and Solve Members. They cana dvance our solution with funding introductions/facilitations and the areas highlighted for partnership above. 

ALLO MOMS connects low-income mothers with affordable healthcare community resources through messaging apps.

ALLO MOMS connects low-income mothers with affordable healthcare community resources through messaging apps. We work with a number of public hospitals and public doctors to advance quality care for low income women and mothers.