WEIGHT LOSS: The New Gadgets Helping Us Against All the Odds

The weight loss process doesn’t have to be about scarcity. It can be insightful, allow us to know more about ourselves and our bodies, and enrich other parts of our lives.

 

This year’s developments in the weight loss industry have got everyone talking. With these recent innovations, it has never been easier to achieve the weight that makes you happy. 

Gadgets

Lumen

Last month a new product made waves amongst the health community. Lumen is a smart little handheld device that measures your metabolism in real time as you breathe into it. 

Connected to your smartphone, the device shows the user how their body is burning energy throughout their day. Diet, lifestyle changes, and even sleep quality can affect whether your body burns fat reserves for energy (aiding weight loss and a healthy lifestyle) or instead burns carbohydrates. 

The Lumen device can tell users this information with lab-level accuracy, according to Shilpa P. Saxena, M.D. up at Forum Health in Tampa.

For time-stretched people, with families and jobs to put first, the technology to track this information can speed up their goals by a significant measure. They can then personalize their diets and lifestyle choices according to their own unique metabolic needs.

Apple Watch Series 9

The new series of Apple Watch has no major new changes in terms of fitness-related offerings, yet continues to host life-saving health features like the ECG app and irregular heart rhythm notifications. 

The main development in 2024 that may significantly improve the weight loss journey of a busy individual is the new Siri incorporation into the Health App. 

Users of the Series 9 can now ask for health information with just their voice. Perhaps the most crucial time saver is that information can also be logged via Siri. This includes logging medication that’s just been taken and data like weight and measurements. 

The time it takes to record your weight loss journey can be the hardest aspect of the process to upkeep, so this could prove incredibly beneficial to those wishing to speed up their progress while juggling full-to-the-brim lives. 

Fitbit 6

The Fitbit has long reigned in the field of low-maintenance data tracking for health and fitness. Without too many distractions it can make you think about how many steps you are getting in without forcing you out of your routine to exercise and make huge life changes. 

The new Fitbit builds on this unique quality, by incorporating smart-tracking that automatically records physical activities as you complete them. This saves time on lengthy exercise logging that puts so many of us off tracking our fitness goals.

It also logs activities that you might not expect to count as exercise, giving a much-needed boost of motivation that all physical activity is beneficial to us, whatever intensity it might be. 

AI

While AI isn’t going to do your workout for you, there are plenty of ways to get the most out of it when embarking on a lifestyle change.

Some of the hardest parts of weight loss are the thought that has to go behind meal planning, calorie tracking, and even workout plans.

While ChatGPT has been helping with these since it first came into the public eye last year, other AI bots are now making good strides to bring about healthy lifestyles, with an emphasis on positive mindsets and a dose of good humor.

A new chatbot, Pi AI, aims to give ethical advice in a “friendly and fun” manner, while Google Bard delivers diet plans upon request with fully organized recipes, saving heaps of time in creating a shopping list that sticks to a calorie limit.

Alternative Pathways

Non-surgical treatments

Over one-third of the US population is now considered overweight. For those with a BMI above 27, a non-invasive, non-surgical balloon is available to them. 

This has been around for some time and now Spatz Medical has taken the technology one step further, by providing the only adjustable balloon in the world. The balloon is placed orally in the stomach with no surgery needed and has obtained high success rates, as published by the FDA.

The new feature means the balloon can adjust up to maintain weight loss results during the treatment. Adjusting the balloon down curbs the usual side effects that come with a recently installed balloon, reducing the rate of balloon extraction due to intolerance.

This unique feature allows the patient to be flexible in their weight loss path, especially when family and work life have to take priority. 

New Drug-based Treatments

Making headlines last year was a selection of new drugs – or, often, drugs previously approved for treating other conditions – that aid the weight loss process. This year we have already seen a new FDA approval for a weight loss injection, providing another alternative to those looking to drop significant amounts of weight.

What seems clear is that the days of fad diets are over. As in so many areas of our lives, technology is stepping up and providing a more data-driven means of pursuing weight loss goals. Weight loss for a person may be about dropping a few pounds or it may be a response to a serious health issue – if that’s the case, it’s important to check in with a doctor before making radical changes. But whatever someone’s needs are, the technology and health sectors are coming together to provide potential solutions.

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