Cleveland Clinic Diet App

Podcast Transcript

Dr. Scott Steele: Butts and Guts, a Cleveland Clinic podcast, exploring your digestive and surgical health from end to end. Hi again everyone, and welcome to another episode of Butts and Guts. I'm your host, Dr. Scott Steele, the president of Main Campus and colorectal surgeon here at the Cleveland Clinic in beautiful Cleveland, Ohio. And I'm super pleased to welcome back Julia Zumpano, who's a registered dietitian at the Cleveland Clinic, and a multi-time guest here on, to the point where I'm hoping that maybe she'll become my co-host one day. Julia welcome back to Butts and Guts.

Julia Zumpano: Thank you so much for having me. I'd love to be your co-host.

Dr. Scott Steele: So for those who haven't heard one of your many sessions with us in the past, can you give us a little bit of background for the listeners?

Julia Zumpano: Yeah, I've been at the Cleveland Clinic for about 20 years as a registered dietitian. I interned with the clinic. I work in preventive cardiology, it's my primary clinical focus. But I'm the nutrition media liaison for the Cleveland Clinic, so manage a lot of the nutrition media. Great place to be, and I'm happy to be here talking about the app today.

Dr. Scott Steele: Yeah. So today we're going to be talking about the Cleveland Clinic Diet app, a new app that's featuring contents from doctors, nutritionists, behavioral health specialists. That will offer an evidence-based option for consumers seeking sustainable lifestyle and dietary changes. Julia, take us back a little bit, what inspired the development of the Cleveland Clinic Diet app?

Julia Zumpano: Well, I think we as the Cleveland Clinic have so much great information to offer from a holistic approach, and specifically from a nutrition approach. But when I became the nutrition media liaison, I realized what a large following there is in nutrition-related topics. And there's a lot of controversy and misinformation out there. And my main goal was to really provide solid science-backed information from the Cleveland Clinic and our healthcare team. To be able to provide clear guidelines for people in their journey of whatever their health goal may be, but to really be able to provide that solid science-backed data. And then really to allow users to take an aspect of their health in their own hands. The app really allows the user to take ownership of their health by providing a tracking tool, to monitor their dietary intake and to provide education on specific heart health and wellness topics, that are again, written by our health professional team.

Dr. Scott Steele: So walk us a little bit through the app, how does the app help patients manage their diet nutrition? And what are some of the key features of the app that patients will find most useful?

Julia Zumpano: Sure. So the app provides a curated series of courses from experts in nutrition, endocrinology, metabolism, heart health, digestive health, weight management, and mental health. So in addition, the app utilizes FitNow's easy-to-use tracking system, through which individuals may log what they have eaten by scanning a nutrition label, taking a photo, or even voice logging.

Dr. Scott Steele: So how does that app personalize diet plans for individual users? Is it able to accommodate users with specific dietary restrictions if they're gluten-free or dairy-free or vegan?

Julia Zumpano: Well, so instead of enforcing restrictive meal plans, the app really provides personal guidance that fits into each user's unique lifestyle. So when you fill out the onboarding questionnaire, the app will use key information into formatting the daily nutrition recommendations. So if you follow a particular dietary pattern such as vegan or gluten-free or dairy free, you have the flexibility to eat whatever foods you'd like to eat in order to meet your targets. So this helps make sure each plan can be adapted to the unique and personal needs of each user.

Dr. Scott Steele: So Julia, are you recommending any specific diet here with this Cleveland Clinic diet or anything like that? Or is it just moreover just trying to help you manage just your caloric intake or your nutrition in general?

Julia Zumpano: Great question. So when you sign up for the app, there's a series of questions that will place you in one of two plans. So there's a HeartSmart plan and a BodyGuard plan. The HeartSmart plan is designed to really track cardiac-specific nutrition guidelines. So they're set to be more cardiac health-specific, more Mediterranean anti-inflammatory style guidelines. So we're restricting sodium, we're restricting saturated fat, avoiding trans fats, limiting sugar, things like that. The BodyGuard, again, still has those guidelines fed in place, but we did it from more of a holistic approach of health, not so specific to heart health. So in that sense, you get more of a unique plan for you. It is more of a tracking system, but you will get specific nutrient guidelines based on which plan you are distributed to based on the way you answer your questions and your health goals.

Dr. Scott Steele: And so does this app integrate with other health and fitness tools? There's a lot of them out there, how does this integrate with it?

Julia Zumpano: Yeah, so the app integrates seamlessly with Apple Health, Fitbit, and Garmin, making it easy to track your fitness and weight activities. Once connected, the app automatically syncs your data, giving you a complete view of your health and wellness metrics all in one place.

Dr. Scott Steele: So truth or myth, truth or myth, the Cleveland Clinic diet app can replace the need for regular consultations with a dietitian or a weight loss physician.

Julia Zumpano: That's a myth. This app was not designed to replace a healthcare provider. Really, the app was designed for a tracking tool to use in conjunction with working with a certified healthcare provider, to manage your weight or heart health, whatever your goals may be. It just is a nice reinforcement tool. It's a nice way that you can take day-to-day ownership of what your choices are. And you can see those impacts every day by tracking the data.

Dr. Scott Steele: So Julia, do you recommend that people listening out there meet with a dietician or a weight loss physician? Or is this for everyone or is this just a general part of those who may feel like they struggle with weight or they have a bunch of questions about their dietary intake?

Julia Zumpano: So this app can be for anyone. But of course, I always recommend meeting with a healthcare provider. Ideally a dietician when it comes to your weight loss goals, or your health goals in general, whatever they may be. This is a specific tracker so it is designed more to promote weight loss of course, but we designed the HeartSmart plan to specifically create more education around which foods we want to choose more of and which ones we want to have less of to really maintain cardiovascular health and prevention. But meeting with an individual healthcare provider can really, really help. And this can be that tracking tool that can support your visits with them and your progress with them, and it can be shared with them to be able to really take it a step further. Again, it can be used alone as well, the app can be used alone. But generally, if you're really seeking to take your health to the next level, I would highly recommend meeting with a registered dietician.

Dr. Scott Steele: So how can patients get started with the Cleveland Clinic Diet app, and is there a cost associated with it?

Julia Zumpano: Yeah, so the Cleveland Clinic Diet app is available for a free seven-day trial on the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store. We're currently offering a 25% off at checkout, if you sign up for the year. And there's also a promo code you can use Healthy Start for another 30% off promo. So there is a cost, depending on the promotions, it comes out to be about 10 to $15 a month.

Dr. Scott Steele: So what advice would you give to patients who are just beginning their journey towards better nutrition and health?

Julia Zumpano: Well, I think a great first step would be downloading the app for a free seven-day trial and seeing where that takes you. And if you do have the availability of meeting with a registered dietician or a healthcare provider, then that would be another great step.

Dr. Scott Steele: So can you discuss any upcoming features or updates that are planned for the app?

Julia Zumpano: Yeah, so we're hoping to continue to add more Cleveland Clinic programs to the app, that focus on different areas of health and wellness, to help our members hit their specific health goals. We started with the HeartSmart plan, and we're really trying to add more disease specific plans so then we can really meet a much broader audience.

Dr. Scott Steele: Well, that's fantastic. And so now it's time for our quick hitters to get a chance to know you a little bit better. And since we've asked you some questions in the past, we'll get a set of new ones. So first of all, what did you think you were going to be when you grew up?

Julia Zumpano: As a child, I wanted to be a pediatrician. But I knew pretty early on that I wanted to be a dietitian. As soon as I learned about the profession when I was in high school, I knew that's what I wanted to do.

Dr. Scott Steele: What was your favorite toy as a kid?

Julia Zumpano: Oh, good question. I would say anything that moved, so probably a bike or trike. I was always on the move.

Dr. Scott Steele: Number three, if you were to be given a superhero power, what would it be?

Julia Zumpano: Oh, to fly, definitely.

Dr. Scott Steele: And then finally, just being a dietitian, what advice would you have to any listeners out there who are interested in nutrition and thinking about becoming a dietitian?

Julia Zumpano: Oh, I'd highly encourage them, I think it's a phenomenal field. There's so many wonderful aspects of nutrition that you can get into from research, to sports health, to wellness. The sky's the limit so I would highly recommend you go to eatright.org, which is the Dietetic Foundation. So that'd be a great place to start.

Dr. Scott Steele: Fantastic. And so summing this up, how can listeners learn more about the app and stay updated on new developments?

Julia Zumpano: They can sign up for our Health Essentials newsletter by visiting diet.clevelandclinic.org, to stay up to date on the app.

Dr. Scott Steele: Well, that's fantastic. And so, as you heard it here, the Cleveland Clinic Diet app is available for a free seven-day trial on the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store. If you're interested in speaking with a registered dietitian at Cleveland Clinic, please visit clevelandclinic.org/nutrition, that's clevelandclinic.org/nutrition. You can also call 216.444.3046, that's 216.444.3046. Julia, great to talk to you again here on Butts and Guts.

Julia Zumpano: Thanks for having me.

Dr. Scott Steele: That wraps things up here at Cleveland Clinic. Until next time, thanks for listening to Butts and Guts.