Research and industry partnership in nutrient calculation software development

Research dietitians have unique computational needs not satisfied by currently available dietetic software. A nutrient calculation and food management software system called ProNutra was developed in partnership with researchers and industry from two National Centers for Research Resources (NCRR) at the National Institutes of Health Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants. Procedures involved in designing research diets were determined by interviewing researchers and specifications were written to facilitate the work described. Key tasks described by researchers included planning the study schedule, developing the diet prescription, planning menu(s) to match the prescription. describing the subjects, adjusting menu to subject needs, generating directions for preparing diets, calculating actual food consumption and exporting nutrient intake data for analysis. Linear programming was used to facilitate the design of diets to match nutrient prescriptions. Software has the potential to increase the accuracy and efficiency in diet design and provide standardization among centers conducting similar studies. Diet calculations were already computerized in all centers interviewed. The greatest savings in time expected from further computerization were from adjusting diets to meet a specific prescription, factoring diets to meet varying caloric needs of individual subjects and in generating specific instructions for kitchen personnel. (C) 2001 Academic Press.