May 1, 2014

New smartphone app promises to keep the doctor away longer

Innovative minds have an opportunity to turn their ideas into reality and share in $40,000 worth of prizes.

A Pitch competition that in its first year launched a health app, lead to a Twitter data grant and a new type of condom is now taking entries for the 2014 round of the competition that offers a share of $40,000 in prizes to UOW staff and students to get their innovative ideas off the ground.

Entrants compete in separate categories for undergraduate students, postgraduates as well as staff.

An award will also go to the best overall pitch. Shortlisted entrants will receive pitch training and will be required to present a five-minute pitch to a panel of experts.

It was through winning seed funding at the UOW Pitch 2013 competition that has enabled dietitian and honorary clinical lecturer Kelly Lambert to develop her idea for a smart phone application that would help people with chronic kidney disease and their families better manage their health. 

Her healthy diet app was borne out of frustration at the at the lack of necessary and informative detail available on food packaging and knowledge about the constituents of fresh foods.  

Her pitch, honed through training received at UOW Pitch, was to pose a seemingly simple question: If you had to choose the healthiest food option for a person with kidney disease what would you pick – a bag of potato chips, a bottle of orange juice or a banana?

If you answered the banana, guess again.

While bananas are a great food choice for healthy people, they contain high levels of potassium, which can be potentially fatal for people with late stage kidney disease and those undergoing kidney dialysis treatment. Yet not all packaged foods list potassium content and few people have a good knowledge of which fresh foods are high in potassium.

“There must be an app for that,” would be the suitable refrain.

Through UOW Pitch 2013 Ms Lambert won $4000 in the staff category and is close to launching a comprehensive diet management application for people with chronic kidney disease.

“Chronic kidney disease patients undergoing renal dialysis were constantly asking questions like ‘Are oranges ok to eat?’ It’s too hard for some people to decipher food labeling or remember long lists of foods and it led to thinking there must be an app for that.

“One of the big problems with existing diet applications is that they draw on US data which can be very different to the foods we consume in Australia. With the money from the Pitch competition I was able to take the idea to a developer who was willing to work on building an app suited to kidney disease patients.”

The app provides the user with functionalities that allows them to enter their vital health statistics and create a health profile that will set limits on their daily intake.

In the supermarket aisle, the user can search a database of more than 3000 foods for a specific item or meal and learn about its content or scan a bar code to receive data on packaged foods or even entire meals.

In addition, the app can be used to keep an eating diary and the data then emailed to dietitians who can analyse eating habits and provide dietary advice to help people with kidney disease better manage their condition.

Nurses and other health care professionals or the patient’s family will also be able to use the app to assist older people, their relatives, patients and those who do not have ready access to technology.

“It gives people dietary freedom to be sure about what they are eating and sometimes even alert them to foods they didn’t think they could eat.

“We know there are 10000 people in Australia undergoing renal dialysis but there are about 3 million who are at stage 3 of kidney disease so we have a looming tidal wave of people who need accurate information to help them retard the disease’s progression.”

Ms Lambert said UOW Pitch provided invaluable training in presenting her idea and has also opened up collaborations and partnerships that were otherwise not possible.

She hopes to launch the app later this year and make it an essential part of the information toolkit for people diagnosed with kidney disease.

Through the support of SAF funding and industry sponsorship from Tibra Capital and Davies Collison Cave, the UOW Pitch competition, is designed to build on the success of iAccelerate and further promote student and staff involvement in entrepreneurialism and the commercialisation of ideas, inventions and research outcomes at UOW.

Director of Innovation and Commercial Research Ms Elizabeth Eastland said the UOW Pitch competition was about finding the bright, energetic entrepreneurial-minded people who are passionate about their ideas but may lack the necessary financial resources to pursue them.

“We want to foster a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship within the UOW community that will have flow-on benefits for the region and its transformation into a technology hub.”

For details and to apply, visit the UOW Pitch Competition website.

To receive regular updates and further information about UOW Pitch join the mailing list.

UOW Pitch Key Dates
Applications Open	1 May
Applications Close	13 June
Finalists Announced	21 July
Pitch Training	6 August
Competition Pitch Days	20, 21 August
Awards Party	28 August