Development and Pilot Testing of the Eating4two Mobile Phone App to Monitor Gestational Weight Gain

作者：Knight Agarwal Catherine^*; Davis Deborah Lee; Williams Lauren; Davey Rachel; Cox Robert; Clarke Adam

来源：JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 2015, 3(2): e44.

DOI：10.2196/mhealth.4071

• pregnancy
• mobile phone
• antenatal care
• maternal obesity
• intervention

Background: The number of pregnant women with a body mass index (BMI) of 30kg/m(2) or more is increasing, which has important implications for antenatal care. Various resource-intensive interventions have attempted to assist women in managing their weight gain during pregnancy with limited success. A mobile phone app has been proposed as a convenient and cost-effective alternative to face-to-face interventions.
Objective: This paper describes the process of developing and pilot testing the Eating4Two app, which aims to provide women with a simple gestational weight gain (GWG) calculator, general dietary information, and the motivation to achieve a healthy weight gain during pregnancy.
Methods: The project involved the development of app components, including a graphing function that allows the user to record their weight throughout the pregnancy and to receive real-time feedback on weight gain progress and general information on antenatal nutrition. Stakeholder consultation was used to inform development. The app was pilot tested with 10 pregnant women using a mixed method approach via an online survey, 2 focus groups, and 1 individual interview.
Results: The Eating4Two app took 7 months to develop and evaluate. It involved several disciplines-including nutrition and dietetics, midwifery, public health, and information technology-at the University of Canberra. Participants found the Eating4Two app to be a motivational tool but would have liked scales or other markers on the graph that demonstrated exact weight gain. They also liked the nutrition information; however, many felt it should be formatted in a more user friendly way.
Conclusions: The Eating4Two app was viewed by participants in our study as an innovative support system to help motivate healthy behaviors during pregnancy and as a credible resource for accessing nutrition-focused information. The feedback provided by participants will assist with refining the current prototype for use in a clinical intervention trial.

• 出版日期2015-6