AI and digital assistive technologies and reproductive rights among women with disabilities in Egypt: a qualitative...

This study examined the potential contribution of artificial intelligence (AI)-supported and digitally enabled assistive technologies to reproductive-health-related access among women with disabilities in Minya Governorate, Egypt. It focused on access to reproductive healthcare services and information and on anticipated informed decision-making.

An exploratory qualitative case-study design was used. In-depth interviews were conducted with eight never-married women aged 15-49 years with physical (n = 4) or visual (n = 4) disabilities. The study was guided by feminist theory, human-centered AI, and socio-technical systems theory, and the interview data were analyzed using the SWOT framework.

Participants perceived smart wheelchairs, prosthetic limbs, screen readers, smart canes, and AI-enhanced glasses as supporting mobility, navigation, information access, and potential access to healthcare services. Women with physical disabilities primarily emphasized mobility, whereas women with visual disabilities emphasized navigation and information access. Key barriers included high costs, limited maintenance services, privacy concerns, inaccessible infrastructure, insufficient healthcare-provider competencies, economic dependency, and social stigma.

AI-supported and digitally enabled assistive technologies may create enabling conditions for reproductive-health-related access and anticipated informed decision-making. However, the findings do not demonstrate that reproductive rights or improved health outcomes were directly achieved. Their perceived usefulness depended on supportive economic, institutional, infrastructural, familial, and sociocultural conditions. Given the small purposive sample and exploratory design, the findings are context-specific and should not be broadly generalized.