"Weigh Easy": Use of an At-Home Weight Reporting System to Improve Weight Monitoring in Infants With a Cleft.

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness and parental satisfaction of an at-home weight reporting system for the maintenance of weight stability in infants with cleft lip and/or palate (CLP).

Design: A prospective cohort of infants with CLP was provided an at-home scale to track weekly weights compared to a retrospective cohort of infants with CLP that underwent standard weight checks at routine healthcare appointments.

Setting: Tertiary care pediatric hospital.

Patients/participants: Infants from 0 to 3 months of age who presented to a large midwestern Cleft Clinic with a diagnosis of CLP without a secondary major birth difference.

Interventions: "Weigh Easy" at-home scale and reporting system.

Main outcome measure(s): Weight loss or plateau.

Results: Infants enrolled in the prospective cohort (n = 25) were significantly less likely to have a destabilizing weight loss compared to the retrospective cohort (n = 131) (OR = 0.09, 95% CI = 0.01-0.60, P = .001 at 30 g/day; OR = 0.15, 95% CI = 0.04-0.60, P = .001 at 25 g/day; OR = 0.24, 95% CI = 0.09-0.61, P = .002 at 20 g/day). Over at least 90 days of data collection, the prospective group had a median of 12 weight changes compared to 4 in the retrospective cohort (P < .001). The Parent Satisfaction Survey (n = 17) revealed 94.1% preferred to weigh their child at home with the Weigh Easy Scale compared to commuting to a publicly available scale and 88.2% would recommend the "Weigh Easy" scale to their friends and family.

Conclusions: Providing parents of infants with CLP with the "Weigh Easy" scale identifies feeding and nutritional needs more quickly than standard weight checks.