Background: Human-centered design (HCD) and design thinking are innovative approaches to problem solving involving building deep empathy with your consumers, extensive brainstorming, and building prototypes. Through the IM CoIIN, the Border States CoIIN, led by PCI and supported by Abt Associates, is pioneering the use of HCD to reduce infant mortality by designing interventions to increase early prenatal care utilization among Latina women residing in four US border states.

Methods: State teams conducted the Inspiration and Ideation phases of HCD. Activities involved facilitated design exercises including, “How Might We” innovation brainstorming, user journey mapping, visual thinking, story boarding, design sprints, prototype development, and user simulation and testing.

Results: Four Ideation Workshops and Design Sprints with 100+ participants were held. Teams conducted lightning talks, asked How Might We questions, created idea sketches, and developed 14 prototypes. Four prototypes were selected to advance to the demonstration phase: a prenatal transfer record to document prenatal visits taking place in other countries, a mobile messaging system for teens to ask confidential questions about pregnancy testing, a web-based screening and self-referral tool to link women with providers, and a pregnancy “passport” to reduce time between confirmation of pregnancy and first prenatal visit. Prototypes continue to be tested.

Conclusions: HCD and design thinking can be successfully applied in the public health context to create interventions aimed at reducing infant mortality. In-person trainings and one-on-one coaching on HCD techniques and tools can overcome resistance by key stakeholders and partners new to these methods.