Chatbot is an Artificial Intelligent technology (AI) that has been used in several computer assistive social interactions. They are designed to convincingly simulate how humans behave in a natural conversation with a partner. Information Technology and AI have been deployed in health care especially in medical information but such deployment can be enhanced with a chatbot in antenatal services. Maternal and newborn mortality is still on the rise in Nigeria and medical personnel are in short supply, hence a virtual expert that can assist the pregnant mothers in basic medical advice is suitable. A preliminary survey was conducted to ensure the desirability of the system where data obtained from two categories of respondents, medical experts and beneficiaries (pregnant mothers) were analyzed and the result shows that both categories of respondents generally agreed on the desirability of the antenatal chatbot. Objective: The proposed design in this paper suggests a Microsoft Azure server hosting and managing the knowledge-based back end. Method: It applies Deep Neural Network engine for analyzing the user queries and generating responses using Artificial Intelligence Markup Language (AIML). A good and implementable prototype from our design will ensure an ante-natal chatbot (Ante-natalbot) system that can analyze preferences of the users and be able to intelligently predict or provide better user-centric recommendations. Result: This intelligence will be achieved at the full implementation of the Ante-natalbot system with reference to the expert (physician) responses over time. Conclusion: This paper is an early step into exploring the concepts, and the acceptability of such a system by the practitioners and the beneficiaries (pregnant women). It serves as in-road into the implementation of a virtual system that simulate professional personnel services to the ante-natal service seekers.

Keywords : Ante-Natal Care, Artificial Intelligence, ChatBot, Human Aware AI, Virtual Agents