Dr. Aparna Hegde is the Founder, Chairperson and Managing Trustee of ARMMAN, a well-regarded nonprofit dedicated to the wellbeing of mothers and children under the age five, based out of Mumbai. She conceptualized the four projects of ARMMAN; mMitra (urban) and Phone Sakhi (rural) [weekly mobile voice call and animation services for pregnant women and mothers with children under age one), HERO (Helpline for Emergency Response Operations), Arogya Sakhi home-based care and the Mother and Child High-Risk Factor Tracking system projects based on her experiences during residency and lecturer’s post at Sion hospital, Mumbai. ARMMAN’s work will impact more than a million lives over the next three years and it is one of the very few home grown NGOs in the country which make innovative use of mhealth and technology to implement projects at scale. For her exceptional social entrepreneurship, she was awarded the Prerak award by IIM Lucknow in 2013, the Ganatra award for social work by Mumbai Obst and Gyn Society in 2011, the “People’s Choice award” at the Saving Lives at Birth event in Washington DC in 2011 and was invited to give a talk at the TEDX Gateway event in Mumbai in December 2014. She is also one of five global women leaders featured in the 2015 Voice of America documentary “A Single Step: Journeys of Women Leaders” narrated by Academy award winning actress, Sally Field. Armman’s mMitra project was a finalist at the mBillionth Award for South Asia in 2014 and its Arogya Sakhi home based care project won a special mention at the mBillionth Award for South Asia in 2015. ARMMAN’s mMitra project is a finalist in the Mobiles for Good award in 2015. Dr. Aparna Hegde is the country’ leading urogynecologist and pelvic floor reconstructive surgeon. She is the Director and Co-Founder of the Urogynecology and Pelvic Health Institute (UPHI) in Gurgaon, Delhi NCR, a first-of-its-kind, clinical and academic international centre of excellence in the field of Urogynecology and pelvic reconstructive surgery in the country. UPHI is a unique premium boutique hospital, designed keeping patient comfort, safety and privacy in mind, providing world class diagnostics and treatments, many introduced for the first time in the country, for prolapse, bladder and bowel problems and sexual problems. She holds MD (Obgyn, Mumbai University), DNB, FCPS (Gold Medal), DGO degrees and a MS degree from Stanford University. She was awarded the prestigious IUGA (International Urogynecological Association) International fellowship in Urogynecology and pelvic reconstructive surgery which is awarded to only one person every year in the world and completed her two year fellowship in the prestigious department at Cleveland Clinic Florida, USA. She was fortunate to train under the renowned urogynecologist and vaginal surgeon, Dr G Willy Davila who is the current President of the IUGA and is very happy to bring the latest in the field to India. Dr. Hegde is also a trained laparoscopic surgeon having completed a two-year fellowship at the premier endoscopic tertiary centre of Mumbai, the Women’s Hospital (formerly BEAMS) before leaving for the US. Dr. Hegde is an accomplished researcher with multiple national and international research awards and more than 74 abstracts and publications in peer-reviewed international and national journals. She is the Member of the Editorial Board of International Urogynecology Journal (IUJ) and a reviewer for the IUJ and the European Journal for Obstetrics and Gynecology and Reproductive Biology. Her pioneering work in the field of 3D and 2D sonographic assessment of the pelvic floor is recognized internationally and the protocols she has created (especially on imaging of slings) has now been adopted at her alma mater, Cleveland Clinic Florida and other US and Canadian universities. She was awarded a best paper award for her work at the 2013 American Urogynecological Society (AUGS) Annual meeting in Las Vegas. She was invited as an expert to conduct a round table on her work on imaging of slings at the 2014 IUGA/AUGS (American Urogynecological Society) combined meeting in 2014 at Washington DC and at the IUGA 40th annual meeting in July 2015 in Nice, France. She has been faculty in the IUGA ultrasound workshops in 2012 – 2015. She was awarded an unprecedented seven oral presentations at the IUGA annual meeting in 2013 and six oral podium presentations at the AUGS meeting in 2013 for her pioneering work in the field. Dr. Hegde is routinely invited national and internationally as faculty to share her expertise in the field of urogynecology. She was invited to conduct an exclusive workshop on ultrasound along with the leading ultrasound expert, Professor Hans Peter Dietz from Australia, at the Western Society Pelvic Floor Meeting in Edmonton, Canada in April 2014. Dr. Hegde is a keen academician. She is the member of the IUGA Education Committee and also the National Co-Convener for Urogynecology at the ceMAST (Centre for Excellence in Minimal Access Surgery Training), Mumbai. In addition to creating a culture of research and innovation at the centre, she hopes to create rigorous fellowships in the field of urogynecology and pelvic floor reconstructive surgery at UPHI where the next generation of urogynecologists in the country will be trained. A brief description of ARMMAN’s projects and their use of technology to impact lives: ARMMAN’s projects include: 1. mMitra (urban) & Phone Sakhi (rural) mMitra (urban) & Phone Sakhi (rural) are weekly automated voice call services that send timed and targeted preventive health care information to the phones of the enrolled pregnant women and the mothers of infants through pregnancy and infancy. The free weekly/twice a week voice calls are specific to the gestational age or age of the infant and are in their chosen language and time slot. Phone Sakhi in rural India also includes one minute animations on important topics of maternal and infant care, coded onto the mobile phones of village health workers so as to reinforce the information given through voice calls. mMitra service aims to reach 5 million urban poor women across India in ten years. We already have more than 170,000 subscribers to the service in Mumbai, Nasik and areas around Mumbai through partnership with Government Hospitals and NGOs. We will begin implementation in Delhi, Bhopal, Indore, Pune and Nagpur in the next three months. At the moment Phone Sakhi caters to women in 250 villages in rural Maharashtra and pockets of rural Karnataka. Implementation will begin in Vashind, Nandgaon, Ratnagiri, Tarapur and Alibaug districts of Maharashtra in the next few months. 2. Arogya Sakhi Home based Antenatal and Infancy Care Arogya Sakhi Home based Antenatal and Infancy Care trains women from the community to become health entrepreneurs providing home-based antenatal and infancy care including performing diagnostic and treatment interventions for a nominal fee. The Sakhis are proficient in performing diagnostic tests including Hb, blood sugar, urine, blood pressure, fetal doppler, anthropometric measurements etc and are given a medical kit with the required equipment to provide home-based care. This project has created 166 social women entrepreneurs who provide affordable health care to their village and in the process become financially independent to provide for their own families. They are supported by a mobile app that guides them through the care process, helps identify high risk signs and symptoms and gives alerts regarding the need for referral. The project has been implemented in 250 villages in Solapur, Washim and Osmanabad districts in rural Maharashtra as a part of a randomized cluster trial funded by DFID UK that also includes Phone Sakhi. In the midline survey conducted at the end of pregnancy, there was more than 75% increase in referrals for high risk factors in the study group that received the home based care. 3. Mother and Child High Risk Factor Tracking with SMS Alert System Mother and Child high risk factor tracking with SMS Alert system is a comprehensive mobile based tool that supports the work of the Auxiliary Nurse Midwives (ANM) and ensures that mothers and children with high risk factors are picked up early and referred in time. It is designed to collate information of all pregnant women and children and use it to track high risk factors and ensure closure of loop in the care provided. The ANMs (auxiliary nurse midwives) will be provided with android based mobile phones with an App that has encoded antenatal, postnatal, infancy and childhood forms. These forms will take the ANM through the signs and symptoms to be noted, diagnostic investigations to be performed and alert them regarding the high risk factor present, treatment to be given and the need for referral. The real time data will be sent through the backend to the primary health centre and district officials to track the care provided. SMS alerts will be sent to the Medical Officer at the Primary Health Centre, ANMs, ASHAs and a family member to ensure that the women and children with high risk factors as well as those who have delayed accessing care, can be identified and provided care in time. This project is being implemented in Nandurbar district of rural Maharashtra. 4. Project HERO Hero (Helpline for Emergency Response Operations) aims to provide real-time information on the availability of ICU beds and blood of the required type in the hospitals and blood banks of Mumbai city through a Helpline, Website, SMS and Mobile App. If there is a change in the availability of beds and/or blood in the first hour after query, an instantaneous SMS will be sent to the caller providing information about the changed status. During personal medical emergencies and mass disasters, precious minutes can be lost running from hospital to hospital trying to find an ICU bed of the required type or blood of the required group, minutes that could mean the difference between life and death! Thus HERO will also form an important component of the disaster management preparedness in the country.