Abstract
Introduction: The current prevalence and affordability of smartphones have enabled a broad diffusion of a variety of mobile applications worldwide for monitoring infant’s growth and nutritional status. However, most of these resources are not comprehensive enough to provide a user-friendly interface for growth tracking combined with proper parental education on nutrition and complementary feeding. Objectives: This work aims to present the development and evaluation of the proposed application "Baby Home", in order to study its potential as a digital tool for supporting parents and caregivers in the nutritional care of their children from home. Materials and Methods: Baby Home integrates an interactive baby growth monitoring interface with a collection of educational content on infant feeding, allowing the user to check the recommended practices based on the estimated nutritional status of their baby. A panel of 7 expert judges was assembled to evaluate the validity of these contents included in the application. Subsequently, a pilot test study was carried out with 8 participating mothers who contributed to the strengths and weaknesses of the proposed functionalities. Results: The developed application shows a positive approval by the consulted specialists and a satisfactory acceptance within the participating mothers thanks to its friendly design and easy-to-use functionalities. The implemented visual resources prove to be suited for the user’s appropriation of feeding contents and their empowerment regarding the nutritional care required by their children. Conclusions: Baby Home is positioned as a practical and accessible support for the nutritional care of infants, providing safeness and confidence to the user in their child's feeding and the possibility of timely detection of growth problems.
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