Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Formative Research
Date Submitted: Aug 14, 2024
Open Peer Review Period: Nov 11, 2024 - Jan 11, 2025
Date Accepted: Feb 21, 2025
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Real-world effectiveness of glucose-guided eating using the Data-Driven Fasting app: An observational study
ABSTRACT
Background:
The Data-Driven Fasting (DDF) app implements glucose-guided eating (GGE), an innovative dietary intervention that encourages individuals to eat when their glucose level falls below a personalised threshold to improve metabolic health. Clinical trials using GGE, facilitated by paper logging of glucose and hunger symptoms, have shown promising results. However, the real-world effectiveness and adherence to GGE supported by a mobile app remain unexplored.
Objective:
To describe DDF users’ demographics, app engagement, adherence to preprandial glucose monitoring, and the resulting impact on weight and glucose levels.
Methods:
Data were collected over three years from users of the Data-Driven Fasting (DDF) app. The analysis covered the first 30 days of app use and included users with at least two days of preprandial glucose entries. App engagement and changes in body weight and fasting glucose levels by weight and diabetes status were examined.
Results:
6197 people used the DDF app for at least two days. Participants used the app for a median of 19 days (25th, 75th percentiles: 9, 28 days), with a median of 7 weight entries (25th, 75th percentiles: 3, 13 entries) and 52 glucose entries (25th, 75th percentiles: 25, 82 entries). Last observation carried forward analysis revealed a weight loss of 0.7 kg (95% CI -0.8, -0.6) in the normal weight category, 1.0 kg (95% CI -1.1, -0.9) in the overweight category, and 1.2 kg (95% CI -1.3, -1.1) in the obese category. Fasting glucose levels increased by 0.11 mmol/L (95% CI 0.09, 0.12) in the normal range, decreased by 0.14 mmol/L (95% CI -0.16, -0.12) in the prediabetes range, and decreased by 0.50 mmol/L (95% CI -0.58, -0.42) in the diabetes range.
Conclusions:
The implementation of GGE through the DDF app in a real-world setting led to consistent weight loss across all weight categories and significant improvements in fasting glucose levels for users with prediabetes and diabetes. This study underscores the potential of the GGE to facilitate improved metabolic health.
Citation
Request queued. Please wait while the file is being generated. It may take some time.
Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.