A study has found that a mobile app that shows children’s weight in real time for obese children results in more weight loss than the existing obesity treatment method. According to the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, families and health care workers can track the same data, facilitating additional individual support when needed.
Treatment of obese children and adolescents needs to be improved. Studies have shown that follow-up visits every two weeks are most effective in maintaining behavioral changes in obese children. However, this is not feasible at home and in the health care system. So we have to find new ways to provide more support.
This study is a one-year ‘practical clinical study’, meaning that the treatment was evaluated in a real clinical setting rather than randomly selected participants.
The research team tried the digital physiotherapy concept over a year on 100 people attending Stockholm’s Martina Children’s Hospital. The app, developed by Evira, is connected to a scale without numbers, and every day children climbed the scale and weighed it. The family tracked the green curve of the target weight and the actual weight curve while checking the child’s weight through the app. Target curves were determined individually and updated through physical visits every 3 months.
Medical professionals also had access to the same data. The chat feature allows medical staff to provide additional assistance, or parents can request additional assistance if needed.
The research team compared the participating children with 300 children enrolled in the Swedish pediatric obesity treatment registry. The control group received routine treatment at another clinic over the same period and was randomly selected, but matched in age and sex with the children in the mobile app group.
As a result, the children who used the app got twice as good results as the control group. That is, I lost more weight.
-More effective for young people
“This app is the first app that doctors and families can use to monitor a child’s weight development in real time,” said Pernilla Danielsson Lilleqvist, who participated in the study as a study author. I was happy to be there,” he said. The app provides more support through continuous feedback, which can lead to clearer outcomes related to treatment.
The mobile app will be used in more clinics in Stockholm, Sweden starting this month. The team is also planning an international study with other countries in Europe.
The study was published in the International Journal of Obesity. The original title was ‘Effect of an interactive mobile health support system and daily weight measurements for pediatric obesity treatment, a one-year pragmatical clinical trial’.
Reporter Lee Bo-hyun [email protected]
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