Weight-loss study uses BlackBerry solution to help participants meet weight-management goalsLeicestershire Nutrition and Dietetic Services (LNDS) provides support for people with diverse nutritional needs, during the treatment and prevention of health conditions. Serving patients in Leicestershire and the city of Leicester, in the UK, LNDS has one of the largest teams of dietitians in the country. It also offers training to institutions, businesses and schools, and works with the Public Health Team to engage the wider public with positive diet and lifestyle messages.

Key Benefits

• Supporting weight-loss programme management

• Cost effective

• Secure push email

• Seamless email to text conversion

• Secure data collection and storage

The Challenge

LNDS runs a number of weight-loss programmes called LEAP (Lifestyle, Eating and Activity Programme)

and is a free NHS weight management group with healthy eating and fun sports activities run by

a dietitian and a local exercise instructor. In the 12-week Programme, participants learn skills to help

them with long-term weight management.

Although LEAP is successful at helping participants lose weight, some see gradual weight regain in the

weeks after the programme and the optional weekly weigh-ins saw varying attendance largely attributed

to petrol costs, work schedules and childcare commitments. LNDS needed to find another way

of providing on-going support. LNDS thought that the key to ensuring continued weight loss would be

to have participants monitor their own lifestyle habits on a frequent basis, reducing the need to attend

face-to-face appointments. LNDS wanted to deliver this on-going support in the most straightforward

and cost effective way possible.

BlackBerry Customer Success Public Sector & Healthcare – Mobile Communications

K1179-Leicestershire Nutrition Case Study (UK).indd 1 24/07/2012 12:29

The Solution

LNDS ran a controlled study among overweight adults who completed the Programme. Participants

who opted to be part of the study were assigned daily goals and twice a week the practitioner would

send text messages to one group of the participants asking them for feedback on their progress.

The control group received no messages and attended the traditional weigh-ins and follow-up sessions.

Eleanor Donaldson, the adult weight management dietitian who led the study, was equipped with

a BlackBerry® smartphone. “We wanted to use BlackBerry because we felt it had an extra layer

of security as opposed to using a regular mobile phone to text our patients,” she explains. The LNDS’s

Information Governance Team also required that the study keep printed records of all conversations

with patients. “We used an application, called SMS2Desk from Cortado, that converted text to email

and vice versa, which meant that I had an email trail of all my conversations with the patients.

With the help of BlackBerry we were able to meet this requirement.”

Most of Donaldson’s messages were written as emails on the BlackBerry smartphone and received

by the participants as text messages. Their text-message replies would land in the inbox of her

BlackBerry smartphone. “BlackBerry enables me to send messages on the move that are tailored

to the patient. Research has shown that it’s the personal and tailored messages that patients respond

to better,” she explains.

Having a BlackBerry smartphone also means that Donaldson can reply to messages that come through

on weekends and evenings. “Patients said they valued the support more and that’s something that

BlackBerry is helping me to provide.”

The Benefits

Because Donaldson didn’t need to be in front of her computer to send and receive messages,

she was able to single-handedly manage the message traffic for the 17 subjects in the intervention

group. “I could usually respond to all the patients’ text messages via BlackBerry during the week

in literally 2 or 3 hours,” she says. “In an hour I would only be able to see about 4 patients in face-to-face

meetings. Texting really is a cost-effective contact method.”

Donaldson adds that using a BlackBerry smartphone has helped reduce how much time she spends

driving to the clinics in the regions – time not spent seeing patients.

When adding in the cost savings related to fuel consumption, the

BlackBerry solution can be viewed as both time and cost effective.

Most importantly, the Study showed that the intervention group

continued to lose weight during the 3-month trial, while the control

group regained some weight. “One BlackBerry made quite

a difference, it really did,” says Donaldson. “Some people were

so keen that they would send me the information without me asking.

They were very engaged. If one little message from a dietitian’s

BlackBerry brightens up someone’s day and makes a difference

to their weight, then it can’t be a bad thing.”

Industry: Public Sector & Healthcare

Region: UK

Company Size: Small

Solution: BlackBerry® smartphones

SMS2Desk from Cortado

“If one little message from a dietitian’s BlackBerry brightens up someone’s day and makes a difference to their weight, then it can’t be a bad thing.”Eleanor Donaldson adult weight management dietitian, Leicestershire Nutrition and Dietetic Services

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