GREGOR PAPA¹, BARBARA KOROUŠIĆSELJAK¹*, PETER KOROŠEC¹, MILIVOJ PILETIČ¹, IRENA HREN², MARKO PAVLIN¹
*Corresponding author
1. Jožef Stefan Institute, Computer Systems Department, Ljubljana, Slovenia
2. General hospital Novo mesto, Nutrition service, Slovenia

Abstract

This study investigated feasibility of a pocket-size scale (named Libra), which provides the mass of the weighed food needed to calculate the grams of carbohydrate intake to be covered by insulin. The scale was designed as a simple and inexpensive measuring device. It is based on a generally available kitchen scale, where a specially designed communication module is added to support Bluetooth communication with a mobile app (named Nutri). The feasibility of the scale was tested by five volunteers, FIT (Flexible Insulin Therapy) diabetes patients from a Slovenian general hospital, who evaluated the scale and the app at home for 21 days. The results of the study proved the simplicity and efficiency of the scale and the app. The system can be easily adapted to suit the needs of patients with other special nutritional needs.

INTRODUCTION

In this paper, we present an innovative nutritional kitchen scale (henceforth scale), named Libra, which supports people with diabetes and pre-diabetes in the self-care of the disease. Several large intervention studies have indicated that good diabetes care can reduce the risk of serious complications (1, 2, 3). The patient’s diabetes-care team helps the patient learn about the basics of diabetes care, and offers support and encouragement along the way. However, the management of diabetes self-care is largely the responsibility of the patient. It requires the patient to make multiple, simultaneous and major dietary and lifestyle changes, which can be difficult. One of the guidelines for the diabetes self-care is carbohydrate counting, which is an effective medical nutrition-therapy option for adults and pediatric patients with Type-II or Type-I diabetes. With this approach, individuals can learn a) to regulate carbohydrate intake with their blood-glucose results, and b) to substitute a selected food item with another for a similar impact on blood glucose. The procedure is as follows:

1. Weigh or estimate the mass of the ...
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