LifeWallet, a Miami-based healthcare technology innovator building modern, digital solutions to promote health, wellness and healthier lifestyles, has become recognized for its work with diabetes prevention programs on a local and national level.
One such program is the Sugar Smart for Life program, a collaborative effort among the GE HealthyCities Leadership Academy, West Kendall Baptist Hospital, Healthy West Kendall and LifeWallet. The Miami-based West Kendall Baptist Hospital/LifeWallet team is one of nine cities nationwide participating in the HealthyCities Leadership Academy Open Invitation Challenge, a program designed to help develop population health improvements through partnerships with private and public entities.
Sugar Smart for Life aims to enhance the role of the Healthy Hub, a free, one stop screening and referral-to-care kiosk located at West Kendall Baptist Hospital. The Hub uses the American Health Association’s Life’s Simple 7 assessment to generate a health score using biometric information gathered by a nurse. Currently many of the Hub visitors are at risk for diabetes and this proposal aims to intervene with those pre-diabetic participants to improve both their clinical and personal health outcomes. The Healthy Hub is powered by LifeWallet’s healthcare technology.
The one-year, innovative program, designed to create healthy lifestyles and prevent the onset of Type ll Diabetes among South Floridians, will run through October.
“One of the keys to any diabetes prevention program is to engage the people diagnosed as ‘pre-diabetic’ and get them actively involved in the process, and we’ve been able to do that,” said Norberto Menendez, LifeWallet founder. “This is an important step in the battle against diabetes and a healthier community.”
According to government studies, Type ll Diabetes costs Americans $322 billion a year, topping heart disease, stroke, cancer, obesity and arthritis among preventable, chronic diseases.
The Sugar Smart for Life program is collecting a variety of data from the 39 participants — ranging in age from 25 to 77 — using digital wearables and Bluetooth-connected devices. Wearables, such as an Apple Watch, help monitor the step count of participants while some members of the study already owned Bluetooth-connected scales to monitor weight. In addition, AgaMatrix’s Bluetooth enabled Jazz 2 Blood Glucose Meter — supplied by the study — tracks the participant’s glucose levels. Participants who did not have iPhones were provided with an iPod Touch for connectivity.
In addition to the Sugar Smart of Life program, LifeWallet has begun to be involved with YMCAs across the country. The YMCA currently has instituted its own Diabetes Prevention Program.
“The key to the Sugar Smart for Life program — as well as the YMCA program and others like it in the future — is engaging the participants and we certainly are pleased with those results,” said LifeWallet’s corporate evangelist Edwin Rivera. “We have collected more than 400,000 data entries from participants and those participants have topped more than five million steps since the study began just two months ago. Participant engagement, combined with proper clinical follow through, is a winning combination in the fight against diabetes.”
In addition to GE and West Kendall Baptist Hospital, other key supporters/partners in the Sugar Smart for Life program include the Florida Department of Health, Baptist Health South Florida, Florida International University, the Health Council of South Florida and the Health Foundation of South Florida.
For more information about LifeWallet, call 1.305.800.LIFE. For more information on HealthyWest Kendall, visit BaptistHealth.net/HealthyWestKendall.
