WellPoint is one of the premier sponsors of text4baby, a free mobile information service designed to promote maternal and child health. An educational program of the National Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies (HMHB) coalition, text4baby provides pregnant women and new moms with the information they need to take care of their health and give their babies the best possible start in life.
Women who sign up for text4baby receive free SMS text messages each week, timed to their due date or their baby’s date of birth. Text4baby is the largest national mobile health initiative to date and is supported by an unprecedented group of public and private partners, including the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
Text4baby’s stated goals are to:
- Demonstrate the potential of mobile health technology to address a critical national health priority: maternal and child health;
- Demonstrate the potential of mobile health technology to reach underserved populations with critical health information;
- Develop a base of evidence on the efficacy of mobile health interventions; and
- Catalyze new models for public-private partnerships in the area of mobile health.
According to U.S. Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra, as of February 2010, text4baby had already delivered more than 1 million free text messages to over 36,000 moms nationwide.