While Singapore is not known to have a major obesity problem, the number of overweight Singaporeans is creeping up as more and more people lead sedentary lifestyles and indulge in an ever growing number of snacks (not to mention the rich local food scene).
The National Population Health Survey conducted in 2022 found that around one in eight Singaporeans were obese, while one in six students under the age of 18 were overweight.
To address the issue, Dr Jocelyn Chew, Assistant Professor at Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies of Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine (NUS), decided to enlist artificial intelligence (AI) to help individuals maintain healthy eating habits throughout the day.
The eTRIP app’s name may suggest another travel service, but it’s actually an abbreviation for Eating Trigger-Response Inhibition Program, and features image-based food recognition to help you count and track calories, as well as a large language model (LLM)-powered chatbot and an eating impulse trigger prediction and prevention system.
Weight loss, after all, starts with what you put on your plate.
The app plays a twofold role. On the one hand, it helps you register everything you eat and monitor daily caloric intake and, on the other, it learns your habits and adjusts its behaviour to intervene and prevent you from snacking on the side, by figuring out when you are most likely to battle unnecessary cravings.
Its role is that of a health coach right in your pocket, actively reminding and motivating you to stick to the plan.
The program started in 2023, with three phases planned—the last of which is nearing its conclusion:
At the Singapore Prevention & Cardiac Rehabilitation Symposium, which took place over the past weekend, Dr Chew shared the latest results of the 12-week trial conducted on over 400 participants with a Body Mass Index of 23 or higher.
They seem to be quite promising.
80% of them have developed healthier eating habits and the average weight-loss recorded across the entire group was 3kg, although the most successful individuals shed up to 13kg—or about 1kg per week. That is both quick and healthy.
The AI advantage
You might be wondering what the big deal is—after all, there are many other health tracking apps available already. But it’s their still limited functionality that led Dr Chew to pursue the creation of a smarter, intelligent solution that would be more proactive in interaction with the user:
People ask how eTRIP is different from everything else on the market. A simple answer would be the level of personalisation we offer—eTRIP’s AI-based algorithm is able to learn users’ behaviour and tailor the intervention accordingly.
Dr Jocelyn Chew
According to Dr Chew, the app can predict when the user is likely to snack based on behavioural data. For example, if a user typically snacks at 11PM while watching TV, the app can send a personalised prompt at 10:55PM to remind them of their motivations for losing weight or strategies to manage overeating.
While early versions are available in app stores on Android and iOS, the app is still under development, with data being collected and reviewed and new features continuously being added.
For instance, the ongoing third phase was expected to include active glucose monitoring, allowing the software to notify the users of spikes or drops in its levels and providing recommendations on the fly. It also allows you to adjust the tone of voice and personality of the chatbot—whether you prefer gentler, more encouraging language or perhaps a tough sergeant, enforcing discipline that you’re struggling with.
It’s clear that the goal is to take advantage of AI and create something more than just a passive tracker of what you ate every day, but rather an active, always monitoring, always thinking personal assistant, who understands your needs, behaviours and character.
Of course, at the end of the day you’re still the one bearing the responsibility. But perhaps thanks to eTRIP it might feel like you’re not carrying it alone—and that might be just enough for many people to find the breakthrough they were looking for.
Featured Image Credit: abillion/ Unsplash