Aiming to increase safe birth assistance by learning world-level sanitary standards and knowledge on midwifery
Castalia Co., Ltd., together with Dr. Yoko Shimpuku, then-Associate Professor, Family Nursing, Department of Human Health Sciences, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University (now Professor, Global Health Nursing, Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University), launched a feasibility study as part of a midwife education project in Tanzania, using Goocus, a mobile learning platform developed by Castalia. A dedicated app that carries information and knowledge on midwifery such as WHO's latest birth care guidelines allows the midwives to acquire information. The project aims to lower the high death rate of expectant and nursing mothers, which have been an issue in the said country. The details of the entire project will be announced when Prof. Shimpuku delivers a lecture at the Japanese Telemedicine and Telecare Association conference in February 2021.
This project was launched in April 2019 as part of Kyoto University's SPIRITS (Supporting Program for Interaction-based Initiative Team Studies), under the Program for Promoting the Enhancement of Research Universities sponsored by MEXT (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology). Information and knowledge such as WHO's sanitary standards and latest birth care guidelines are loaded on the app with illustrations tailored in the context of an African environments and videos in Swahili, all aiming to lower the high death rate of expectant and nursing mothers in Tanzania. The app allows the comparison of the students' awareness levels as well as the learning levels of knowledge before and after the learning process. In addition, a midwives' community is created on the app for them to share their birth assistance experiences and traditional techniques, and have discussions based on the culture and perspectives unique to Tanzanian people, which can be analyzed for the research on midwifery practices that have traditionally been difficult to get the picture.
In February 2020, we gave instructions on the manipulation of the app to 24 midwives at a mid-level hospital in Dar es Salaam, and supported their autonomous learning process for a two-month period. Thanks to the needs in learning in the first place and the app that has a social networking function which allowed the midwives to casually ask for advice on things that they had not been able to find solutions for and to encourage learning through communications among them, their learning persistence rate turned out to be 90%, very high for autonomous learning in Africa.
We will expand the target to more hospitals and midwives to popularize this midwife education app in Tanzania.
Midwife education app interfaces
Midwives in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
A midwife learning autonomously on her smartphone
■ Dr. Yoko Shimpuku : Biography
Professor, Global Health Nursing, Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University
After graduating from the former St. Luke's College of Nursing (the current St. Luke's International University), Dr. Shimpuku worked as a midwife and then completed her studies at University of Illinois at Chicago, College of Nursing, where she acquired her doctorate. In 2011 she was an intern at World Health Organization Office for South East Asia, and the following year an assistant professor at St. Luke's International University School of Nursing.
Dr. Shimpuku's career has garnered a number of honors and memberships; she won the 2012 inaugural Symbols of Tomorrow Award in Nursing and Healthcare. She had the honors of lecturing the Princess Akishino of the Royal Family of Japan in 2014 and 2015. In 2017, she became the specially appointed member of the 23rd term of Young Academy of Japan within Science Council of Japan, where she was appointed Vice-Chair in the 24th term and Chair of the International Branch Meeting. Since 2018 she has been a member of the Gender Equity Branch Meeting at Science Council of Japan. Furthermore, she is also a member of Global Young Academy, an international society of 200 young scientists from around the world, where she has also been selected an Executive Committee.
In 2018, Dr. Shimpuku was appointed Associate Professor, Family Nursing, Department of Human Health Sciences, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University. In 2020, she has become Professor, Global Health Nursing, Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University.
URL：https://researchmap.jp/yokosh
■Goocus
Goocus is a mobile learning platform developed by Castalia. Setting the "continuity of learning" based on smartphones as the principal axis of development, the system pursues "social learning", the "visualization of learning experiences", and "gamification" in search of the ways to make learning an everyday act.
URL：https://en.castalia.co.jp/goocus