Health technology company Royal Philips is joining forces with Ingeborg Initiatives, a maternal health company, to provide expectant parents in Arkansas with access to the Philips Avent Pregnancy+ app with personalized information provided by the state and tools to increase access to care.

The aim of the partnership is to enhance health literacy and encourage users to embrace healthy habits. 

Arkansas residents who download the Pregnancy+ app will automatically gain access to customized content.

According to Royal Philips, pregnant and postpartum mothers who use their Pregnancy+ app report higher maternal health literacy, show more interest in engaging in early and regular prenatal care, and acquire healthier habits versus those who do not use pregnancy apps.

"At Philips, we are deeply committed to advancing maternal health and access to care through education and innovative technology, and Pregnancy+ is just one way we are doing that," Dana Medema, head of personal health at Philips North America, said in a statement. 

"No one organization is going to be able to address the maternal health crisis alone, but collaboratively, we can meet moms where they are and give them access to the care they need."

"Maternal health in Arkansas is in crisis," Olivia Walton, founder and CEO of Ingeborg Initiatives, said in a statement.

"Lawmakers are now focused on it, but it is going to take all stakeholders – public, private, philanthropic – to get women the care they need before, during and after birth. We want to meet moms where they are, on their phones – providing them with the necessary resources at their fingertips."

THE LARGER TREND

In January, Julia Strandberg, executive vice president and chief business leader of connected care at Royal Philips, told MobiHealthNews that key healthcare trends in 2024 included advancements in home-based care and digital health reimbursement. 

"Advancements in home-based care technologies highlight the industry’s mission to extend high-quality care beyond the walls of a hospital, helping to improve patient outcomes and reduce the strain on healthcare facilities. However, scaling this model continues to be a challenge," Strandberg said.  

In 2024, Royal Philips launched Philips Avent Premium Connected Baby Monitor, which comes with the company's proprietary SenseIQ sleep, breathing-tracking and cry-detection and translation technologies.

A baby unit camera, parent unit and the Philips Avent Baby Monitor+ mobile app give parents the ability to view the baby, while SenseIQ tracking technology assesses millions of pixels every second and translates the chest motions of a baby's breathing into sleep status and breathing rate updates. The monitor does not require a wearable device.

Also in 2024, the ninth edition of Royal Philips' Future Health Index report noted that more than six in 10 APAC leaders polled said they planned to invest in genAI in the next three years. At the time, nearly 40% of them had already invested in the technology. 

While there was great passion about healthcare AI's potential, almost all leaders surveyed in the region said they were heavily concerned about "data bias in AI applications widening disparities in health outcomes."

In 2023, Royal Philips announced the release of its next-generation AI-enabled advanced visualization workspace, its AI Manager and the BlueSeal MR Mobile Unit. 

The company's visualization workspace for health systems is an AI-powered offering aimed at improving workflows using a single platform for multiple modalities. 

That same year, Royal Philips received $44.6 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which brought its total received to $60 million, to support the global deployment of the tech giant's AI-enabled, FDA-cleared Lumify Ultrasound System.