Development of a Mobile Application to Represent Food Intake in Inpatients: Dietary Data Systematization

Abstract

Background Nutritional risk situations related to decreased food intake in the hospital environment hinder nutritional care and increase malnutrition in hospitalized patients and are often associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Objective To develop and test the reliability of a mobile application as a virtual instrument to assess the acceptability and quality of hospital diets for inpatients. Methods: This intra- and interobserver development and reliability study investigated an in-hospital food intake monitoring application based on a validated instrument for patients with infectious diseases who were treated at the Evandro Chagas National Institute of Infectious Diseases (INI/FIOCRUZ). The instrument was sequentially administered to patients 48 h after admission to INI hospital units using the printed instrument (paper) and the tested digital application (ARIETI) simultaneously. The tested reliability factor was the consistency of the method in the digital platform, checking whether the application provided equivalent data to the paper instrument, and finally a statistical analysis plan was performed in the R platform version 4.2.0. This project was authorized by the FIOCRUZ/INI Research Ethics Committee under CAAE 35379820.4.0000.5262. Results The ARIETI was developed and tested for reliability in 70 participants, showing similar ability to show caloric intake in Kcal (p = 1.72 E-03), protein intake (g) (p = 0.006362), the proportion of caloric intake (p = 1.54 E-05), and the protein intake (p = 0.003501) relative to the prescribed goal. The application was superior to the paper-based instrument, accelerating the diagnosis of nutritional risk based on food intake by up to 250 s (50–350 min). Conclusions The ARIETI optimized the time between diagnosis of nutritional risk related to dietary intake and the nutritionist’s decision making, showing an improved ability to maintain information quality compared to the paper-based instrument.