Developing SMARThealth pregnancy (SHP)GPT: addressing gender bias in LLM for community health workers in rural India
File(s)
Author(s)
Type
Conference Paper
Abstract
The rapidly broadening scope of Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions across diverse healthcare domains can serve as a valuable tool for addressing existing health inequities. As researchers, we need to be aware of the complexities and limitations of historical imbalances and disparities in access to healthcare and its outcomes in the global South. Thus, it becomes imperative to create effective, innovative, interdisciplinary technology that removes barriers to women's equality and representation, without deepening real-life biases. In this paper, we discuss our approach to incorporating a gender intersectional perspective into the design, development and deployment of an AI chatbot for community health workers (ASHAs) in rural India. ASHAs, who are predominantly women in India, are at the forefront of the healthcare delivery system but they are often not provided with adequate support for their continuous learning. This chatbot was developed to aid the ASHAs to provide guideline-based essential healthcare information to pregnant and postpartum women, particularly to address health challenges including anemia, hypertension and gestational diabetes mellitus and even mortality in rural communities. Our case study demonstrates the significance of co-developing an AI chatbot with local actors, such as ASHAs, who understand the needs and challenges of local vulnerable communities. Further, we explore if an AI solution can bridge the gaps faced by ASHAs in a resource-constrained and fragmented public health system like India, which in turn, can make way for better science practice and dissemination in the future.
Date Issued
2026-04-17
Date Acceptance
2025-01-01
Citation
2025 Gender and Technology Conference (GTC), 2026
Publisher
IEEE
Journal / Book Title
2025 Gender and Technology Conference (GTC)
Copyright Statement
© 2025 IEEE. This is the author’s accepted manuscript made available under a CC-BY licence in accordance with Imperial’s Research Publications Open Access policy (www.imperial.ac.uk/oa-policy)
License URL
Source
2025 Gender and Technology Conference (GTC)
Publication Status
Published
Start Date
2025-01-16
Finish Date
2025-01-19
Coverage Spatial
Kollam, India
Date Publish Online
2026-06-01