Talk:Weight Management

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Could we fold the 'Commercial Products' section down into sub-headings/pages e.g. 'Online Weight Management', 'In Home Weight Management' etc.? Just to avoid having a long list of products in the middle of the page... - Niall

In terms of products, you may want to add MiLife (http://www.milife.com/) and Fitbug (www.fitbug.com)

Weight Management and Wearable Body Sensor Networks

There sre several areas where weight management will benefit from the advancement of wearable body sensor networks. There are;

• Motion Activity and Exercise Optimisation Systems. Motion activity systems can be used to give an indication of the amount of physical activity a person has taken, perhaps as part of a personal training program. Optimal training (and weight loss) is a function of things such as heart rate, distance travelled, incline, speed, age, and as we have seen in the Design Aspects of Body Sensor Networks sections there are many devices that can monitor these parameters. Probably not so common is a device that combines all these in to a single form factor such as a mobile phone, however as reported recently, researchers at Intel are working on such a device [1]. The FitSense BodyLAN system is a good example of a system that is designed for the management of weight loss and personal fitness and incorporates step activity sensors, calorific burn, speed, distance and pace. The Nike and Ipod Rock and Run [2] is another example of a wearable body sesnor system that is geared at personal training, calories burned and the motivation thereof. It consists of a simple sensor placed in to the insole of teh Nike training shoe. This communicates wirelessly with an Apple iPod Nano device and records, distance, speed, calories etc. Personal music can be played and motivational messages are also included. Once finished the routine, the data can be downloaded on to an Apple Mac or PC and logged as part of a personal training history. Another system developed at the University of Maryland called the Diamond Suit [3] performs similar functions for upper body workouts. It monitors progress and basic vital signs. It also allows a physician tyo enter a program to a wireless PDA type device an dmonitor progress remotely. It is adaptive in that it can adapt daily work out routines based on the previous day(s) worouts to ensure optimal efficiency of workout,

• Sweat and Body Fat Measurement Techniques - When exercising it is important to drink water (or other Isotonic drink) to avoid dehydration. However too much fluid on board is also a problem and in excessive quantities can be very dangerous. As each individual sweats at different rates, the only really true picture of fluid-in versus fluid-out is to have an sweat analysis operating in real time. The EU Biotex Project [4] aims at developing wearable garments capable of analysing sweat in real time and wirelessly using different techniques such as polymer-based biochemical sensors.

• Cognitive Behavioural and Motivation Methods - All the systems above use motivational techniques as part of a work out/weight management routine. It is well known that the motivational aspect of weight management is critical as the psychology often involves fundamental lifestyle change that people find very difficult. The body sensor networks ultimately will acquire the physical signal from which a computer device will interpret the data and perfrom some cognitive behavioural analysis and generate a response (prompt, message, music etc). While the systems so far are quite crude for example a key prompt or spoken message as the personal training routine nears an end and it is detected that the participant is slowing down. In this instance a change of music or favourite picture for example injected at this point can be very useful.The potential for virtual reality technology here is also promising as are gaming technologies. Prolonged use of such a system can allow the system to 'learn' about the participants patterns (frequency of useage, intensity, weight, speed, typical training profile etc) and can adjust the routine accordingly to achieve maximum efficiency.

A commercial application aimed at behaviour modification relating to exercise, diet, sleep patterns etc i.e. metabolic primes is the Sensewear WMS(tm) [5] system. SenseWear WMS® enables automated monitoring of calories burned, dietary intake, duration of physical activity and sleep giving healthcare professionals a comprehensive tool to assess, motivate and educate their patients and help modify their behavior