?? Snap It Up: AI in Food as Medicine

Why is it so hard to have that apple a day that keeps the doctor away? Dr. Jeff Alfonsi and the Inner Analytics Team asked this question, then answered it with their AI-powered RxFood product.

Imagine being on Day 6 of your saltless broccoli and boiled chicken marathon that you so meticulously weighed because your blood pressure just won’t go down ****- but then your friends bring you to a restaurant with self-serve, spicy, sweet, and greasy portions. Eating healthy is difficult! But what you might not know is that it’s often just as hard from our doctors’ end.

It turns out those food diaries that you fill out after thinking about what you had last Thursday while out after that long day at work really aren’t all that accurate or helpful. So if we can’t arm our healthcare providers with the information that helps them manage their diabetes, is all lost? Is the fight against the age-related onslaught of diabetes, chronic kidney disease, and high blood pressure really unavoidable?

Engineer-turned-Wall Street broker-turned-doctor Jeff Alfonsi, his cofounder Elizabeth Choi, their team at Inner Analytics, and their product, RxFood think not. But how is RxFood different from all the other apps that users have to manually weigh out food for?

Using AI to analyze images of what you’re eating, all the RxFood app needs is a quick snapshot - and before you can say “Margherita with extra cheese”, you’ve got the data uploaded to a report that can be sent to your doctor - with all the clinically-relevant information needed so that you can keep your health in check.

How did this all come to life? Jeff recalls Elizabeth, his friend being quite concerned with the details of food she was consuming. While it seemed odd at first, Dr. Alfonsi later learned that they had Type 1 Diabetes - and needed to keep up this habit so that they would not suffer the consequences of unchecked blood sugars later in life. Elizabeth, who later became Jeff’s cofounder, related that many applications at that time were able to analyze nutritional content, they were complicated to use and unreliable. Together, they founded Inner Analytics.

How did Jeff help spearhead this while practicing Internal Medicine, Obesity Medicine, Clinical Pharmacology and Toxicology? How does the RxFood app work? Check out our interview with him here: https://plnk.to/howitsmed!

You can also find us on Yotube: https://youtu.be/WqHhj2eGzw4