Reaching Moms through Mobile Technology: The Text4baby Program

Text4baby is an innovative, free mobile information service that provides timely health information to women via their cell phones starting in pregnancy and extending through their babies' first year. The text4baby program was developed through a public-private partnership including the National Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition, Voxiva, CTIA-The Wireless Foundation, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Department of Health and Human Services, and other Federal and non-Federal stakeholders. Launched in 2010, the text4baby program offers women an easy, convenient and contemporary medium they know and trust to get information about their health and that of their children. After registering their due date or their baby's birth date by texting “BABY” or “BEBE” to 511411, women receive important messages, guided by solid science, about a host of topics and services, including the importance of prenatal and infant care, immunization, nutrition, mental health, breastfeeding, oral health, smoking cessation, infant feeding, child passenger safety, safe sleep and others. In the first year, 135,000 individuals have signed up, over seven million messages have been sent, and over 450 outreach partners have signed on to promote the service and register pregnant and new mothers. The text4baby partnership model offers a replicable model for public health action. This presentation discusses the partnership model, content development, promotional strategy and evaluation.