Meal plans are, most of the time, the basis for a nutritional program.
So the nutritional intervention is successful, it is important, among other things, that the meal plan is personalized for each client not only qualitatively but also quantitatively, and that it is easily understood by the client.
Taking this into account, defining portions and serving sizes for foods can be very useful, as it allows the client to easily understand and measure the quantity of the food they will eat.
To help nutrition professionals in this process, Nutrium offers information on serving sizes and common measures for some of the most consumed foods.
When creating their recommendations you can select the serving size or common measures for the foods available on the software, but also for the ones that you add manually.
How can I check and define common measures for a particular food?
Access the section Foods on the left side menu and search the food product.
For foods that already exist in the software:
Click the food and access the tab "Common measures" to see the common measures that were defined for that food.
If you want to add new common measures for this food, click on "Duplicate to edit", on the bottom left corner.
After duplicating it, now you can change the name of the food and click on "Add new common measure".
Foods that you created
In case you have added a new food item, the process will be slightly different since you won't need to duplicate it.
Click on the food item, access the tab "Common measures" and click on "Add new common measure".
To add a new common measure, you should register:
Name of the common measure in the singular form - e.g. teaspoon, cup, plate, etc.);
Name of the common measure in the plural form - the name you previously wrote in the plural form so the software does the matching in case you prescribe more than 1 measure/portion to your client;
Quantity - the number of common measures that correspond to a portion;
Total grams - quantity in grams the common measure that was defined contains that food (the same applies for liquids);
The edible portion (%) - edible part of the food, in percentage.
After registering the common measure(s), click on "Save and close".
You can set the number of common measures you want.
How can I use common measures while I am creating the meal plan?
When you are creating the meal plan, you just need to search the food and select the common measure you want.
After selecting the measure, write the number of portions. You can set portions such as 0.5 or 1.5.
Then the common measure will show on the meal plan when it is printed or in the mobile app, as well as the quantity in grams, so the client can easily quantify the foods.
Do you have any questions about adding common measures? Contact us via the software chat!