Abstract:

The US has infant mortality rates far worse than the majority of Western European nations. A disproportionate number of these infant deaths are black infants; in the US, black infants die at a rate of three times that of caucasian infants. While infant mortality is a multi-faceted problem—racism, governmental policies, economics, and healthcare systems are all impactful on the issue— as educators and technologists, the focus of our intervention is the creation of an innovative app designed to provide a closed social network and online group educational platform to allow for the delivery of health education promoting safe and healthy maternal behaviors and access to needed resources so as to reduce infant mortality.

With regard to specific findings, in this presentation, our research group will report on the development of the app and the collaboration our research group has had with a local group of midwives. We will overview the needs of the local community of mothers and midwives, and outline the features of the app developed to meet these needs. We will particularly focus on ways that our group has been able to use the tool of design thinking and iterative and action research methodologies to adapt our expertise and existing tools beyond our traditional area of higher education to reach and educate audiences in healthcare.

Tech-savvy educators have much to offer the health care world—healthcare workers also educate but often lack technological know-how. Given the COVID 19 crisis and need for social distancing, multidisciplinary research and development collaborations allowing for adaption of educational digital tools to settings outside of traditional schools and universities – for instance, adult, community, and patient education—may hold much promise.

Keywords:

Patient education, infant mortality, app.