Body fat monitoring belt

Body fat monitoring belt

Illustrative project image
Approved by mentor

Medical tags

Clinical need
Monitoring purpose
Area
Rehabilitation
Technology
In vitro diagnostic device
Project keywords
bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA),
Device classification
III

Project description

Simple waist belt to monitor and analysis body fat in human body which works on bioelectric impedance principle connected to software that guides users through how to speed up their lipolysis and help them stay in shape with health and fitness related tips.
According WHO

  • In 2016, more than 1.9 billion adults aged 18 years and older were overweight. Of these over 650 million adults were obese.
  • In 2016, 39% of adults aged 18 years and over (39% of men and 40% of women) were overweight.
  • Overall, about 13% of the world’s adult population (11% of men and 15% of women) were obese in 2016.
  • The worldwide prevalence of obesity nearly tripled between 1975 and 2016.

In 2019, an estimated 38.2 million children under the age of 5 years were overweight or obese. Once considered a high-income country problem, overweight and obesity are now on the rise in low- and middle-income countries, particularly in urban settings. In Africa, the number of overweight children under 5 has increased by nearly 24% percent since 2000. Almost half of the children under 5 who were overweight or obese in 2019 lived in Asia.
Over 340 million children and adolescents aged 5-19 were overweight or obese in 2016.
Obesity leads to

  • cardiovascular diseases (mainly heart disease and stroke), which were the leading cause of death in 2012;
  • diabetes;
  • musculoskeletal disorders (especially osteoarthritis – a highly disabling degenerative disease of the joints);
  • some cancers (including endometrial, breast, ovarian, prostate, liver, gallbladder, kidney, and colon).

This non-invasive test simply involves the placement of two electrodes on the waist. A low level, imperceptible electrical current is sent through the abdominal part of the body. The flow of the current is affected by the amount of water in the body. The device measures how this signal is impeded through different types of tissue. Tissues that contain large amounts of fluid and electrolytes, such as blood, have high conductivity, but fat and bone slow the signal down. As BIA determines the resistance to flow of the current as it passes through the body, it provides estimates of body water from which body fat is calculated using selected equations. Following this data the user will be guided through to achieve a healthy body fat level using a mobile application.