Willow is an educational proof of concept. It is not a medical device, not a diagnosis, and not a substitute for your midwife, obstetrician, GP, or emergency services.

Emergency 000 AU · 111 NZ

Willow

Demo day

Not an AI doctor. A guideline-faithful pause between visits.

Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy are common, frightening, and easy to undersell in a ten-minute clinic. Willow is a proof of concept for the conversation that should happen at 11pm when a home cuff reads 142/92 — grounded in SOMANZ 2023, biased toward escalation, and honest about what it is not.

The product bet

  1. Wedge. Home blood-pressure literacy plus red-flag triage education for Australia and New Zealand maternity networks — not a global symptom chatbot.
  2. Moat. Native SOMANZ language, local emergency numbers, culturally specific personas, and a deterministic safety layer that does not wait for the model.
  3. Buyer. Maternity services, obstetric medicine clinics, health funds, and primary-care networks who already tell women to monitor at home and then leave them alone with Dr Google.
  4. Ask. Clinical advisory board, a prospective safety evaluation, and a pathway conversation with TGA / Medsafe before anyone calls this a device.

Conversation design

Lead with the body, not the lecture

If a number or phrase is dangerous, the first sentence is the phone number. Education comes second.

Translate, do not diagnose

Willow may say what SOMANZ means by preeclampsia. It may not say you have it.

Adult warmth

Acknowledge fear. Do not soothe it away. Do not raise it.

One next step

Every ordinary turn ends with a single action and a reminder that Willow is not their team.

Named medicines, no doses to take home

Recognition is useful. Titration is not this product.

Safety architecture

  1. 1. Deterministic scan of the user turn for red-flag language and BP numbers.
  2. 2. Severe band (≥160/110) or emergency symptoms short-circuit the model and return a fixed script.
  3. 3. The same finding is injected into the system prompt so the model cannot talk past it.
  4. 4. Persistent banner: not a device, emergency 000 / 111.
  5. 5. No automatic calls. No background inference. The person has to send.

This is still a research prototype. A shippable product needs clinical review, abuse testing, local-language evaluation, and a regulatory classification decision.

Three personas

Tāmaki Makaurau / Auckland

Aroha Te Rangi

28 weeks + 3 days · first baby

Aroha is 32. At home this morning her validated monitor read 142/92, then 140/90. She has a mild headache that eased after water and a rest. No visual change, no pain under the ribs, baby is moving as usual. She is Māori, well supported by her sister, and waiting on a midwife call-back.

Fear. That one high reading means she already has preeclampsia and will lose the rest of her pregnancy plan.

Job to be done. Understand the difference between gestational hypertension and preeclampsia, and know what to do in the next few hours.

Open Aroha's conversation

Naarm / Melbourne

Sarah Chen

14 weeks · IVF twins · chronic hypertension

Sarah is 38. She has had treated hypertension for four years and is currently on labetalol. BMI 36. IVF dichorionic twins. Combined first-trimester screening is booked. She has not started aspirin yet and is unsure about calcium and exercise.

Fear. That twins plus her blood pressure make preeclampsia inevitable, or that aspirin will harm the babies.

Job to be done. Hear the SOMANZ prevention pathway in plain language so she can have a sharper conversation with her obstetric physician this week.

Open Sarah's conversation

Eora / Sydney

Priya Nair

Day 6 postpartum · breastfeeding

Priya is 29. She was born at 36+2 after preeclampsia. She went home yesterday still taking labetalol. Breastfeeding is establishing. She has leftover ibuprofen from a friend and a pounding headache this afternoon. Her last home reading was 148/94. She has a GP review in two days and no hospital follow-up booked.

Fear. That preeclampsia is 'over' now the baby is out — or the opposite, that she will have a stroke at home.

Job to be done. Know what postpartum care should look like this week, whether ibuprofen is appropriate, and what long-term follow-up actually means.

Open Priya's conversation

Who sits around the table next

  • Obstetric physician (SOMANZ) as clinical lead
  • Midwife with HDP clinics in both a tertiary and a rural service
  • Lived-experience partners, including Māori, Pasifika, and CALD voices
  • Clinical safety officer and conversation designer
  • TGA SaMD / Medsafe counsel — classification before marketing
  • Privacy counsel for health data in AU/NZ
  • Evaluation lead for a prospective safety and usefulness study

How to show this in the room

  1. Open Aroha. Send her 142/92 message. Watch the urgent layer land before the explanation.
  2. Type 168/112. Watch the emergency script fire without waiting on the model.
  3. Switch to Sarah. Ask about aspirin. Hear 150 mg at bedtime, before 16 weeks — and the refusal to prescribe.
  4. Switch to Priya. Ask about ibuprofen. Hear the postpartum NSAID caution and the one-week review.
  5. Close on the library: this is a product with a spine, not a prompt.