A new year, a new platform for better care.
Okkanti is expanding—our network, our product, and what’s possible when maternal health providers work together.
The Problem We’re Solving
The maternal health workforce crisis isn’t just about numbers—though the numbers are stark. Louisiana, where maternal infant death rates are the highest in the country, has taken action- mandating doula coverage through Medicaid and also private insurance.
So if you live in Louisiana, you can get a doula, covered by your insurance?!
Except here’s the challenge.
There are 73 registered doulas in a state that needs 2,000+.1 And there is no clear way to actually connnect with one.
It’s not just about training more workers, but understanding what the workforce is struggling with.
30% of doula capacity goes chronically under-utilized, making full-time practice nearly impossible
40% goes to administrative tasks instead of care 2
Travel burns capacity- especially for postpartum experts whose care is exclusively home-based
Reimbursement opportunities take hours of additional time and present unexpected new challenges
Most doulas aren’t ready for HIPAA compliance and changing industry standards
As insurance and reimbursement expand—through employer benefits like Carrot, through state Medicaid programs—the administrative burden grows. Managing eligibility. Enrollments and billing. Navigating new client expectations.
It makes care delivery far more complex as anyone who has billed insurance knows.
Our users are learning that employer benefit windows create pressure to contain care into 6-week postpartum timelines. When a provider gets sick or isn’t available, families face unexpected bills or want to cancel contracts. Collectives that solved burnout by teaming up hit walls around reimbursement rules that weren’t designed for collaborative models.
What We Built
Okkanti is built on three foundations: a marketplace, an operating system, and a collaboration platform.
A Marketplace
Finding care is ridiculously challenging . Consumers send personal information to a dozen or more providers, hoping to get a response. Intelligent matching brings better matches that support consumers - as they find their trusted person- and puts the right leads in front of the providers who have capacity.
An Operating System
If you’re a doula, a lactation consultant, sleep expert, you have all sorts of tools to share with new parents, but you don’t have tools to run your practice. Particularly if it involves teams or complex care plans, you’re left with patchwork systems and lots of wasted time and risky transfers of personal information.
We built tools purpose-built for how maternal health providers actually work:
Client portals for secure scheduling, communication, and payments
Lead and client management
Package deployment and schedule coordination across teams
HIPAA-compliant information sharing
Complete practice management: leads, schedules, daily notes, documents
In our pilot with early adopters, we saw:
5x faster decision-making (families found and chose care faster)
260 hours saved on administrative tasks
54% higher conversion rates
30% higher revenue
A Collaboration Platform
To deliver seamless care with a fragmented ecosystem, we needed a better way for the patient to be centered as they assemble their doula, lactation consultant, postpartum specialist and other services.
In addition to multi-agency collaboration, Okkanti is built for teams and for the ways doulas actually work.
Collectives can grow and strengthen community without creating traditional ownership structures.
Independent providers can coordinate backup, pick up shifts, and share referrals—even when working with multiple agencies. Your practice and schedule finally make sense.
For adjacent specialists—lactation consultants, pelvic floor therapists, perinatal mental health providers—collaboration is built in. Because pregnant and parenting people already get enough fractured care from health systems. We want to do better.
Our Product is new- our Values Haven’t Changed
Nothing without Compassion: Families deserve to feel safe and supported and not burdened with filling gaps in care. Careworkers are often left out or commodified. We have a practice of listening as we build a culture of care that includes every stakeholder.
Community changes lives: We support the independent practices that comprise our diverse ecosystems of care.
Representation matters: Our ecosystem is built on those with lived experience rising to fill unmet needs. Families deserve choice in finding their trusted support system.
Doulas hold the key: We use technology to center the doula relationship at Okkanti, not to replace it.
We are stronger together: Collaboration delivers seamless support that saves lives AND builds a stronger ecosystem.
Building for Sustainability
We’re starting the new year with a new platform model that can sustain ongoing development.
We’re making tools accessible. We offer options for each stage of growth. Providers get access to more than a searchable profile—it’s the marketplace, the operating system, and the collaboration tools together that form a smarter way of working.
We also built in reciprocity and more ways for providers in our network to grow their earnings.
Why This Matters
The maternal health crisis led to adoption of doula models, but without infrastructure to support providers, birthing people continue to go without life-saving care.
We can’t solve everything at once. But we can build a foundation.
Infrastructure that reduces administrative burden. Tools that support sustainable practices. Platforms that enable collaboration without sacrificing autonomy.
This is how we move from crisis response to lasting change.
If you’re a maternal health provider ready to build something better, join us.
About Okkanti
Okkanti is a maternal health technology platform building the rails for the future of care.
The Lousiana Doula Registry https://ldh.la.gov/page/DoulaRegistry
2023 Community Doula Time Use Study The 2023 Time, funded by HealthConnect One, and was a collaborative effort involving 32 doulas from six organizations within the Doula DataConsortium.