One of the first lines in controlling diseases and malnutrition is diet
therapy and currently, due to tool limitations, for designing the
patients’ diet plan, the food groups and the list of food substitutes
are being used while suitable databases of foods composition are
available. Methods of designing individuals’ diet and total of 8791
foods are reviewed to calculate the nutrients of mixed foods and design
a suitable method of diet therapy with more freedom for the patients in
the future. Food groups because of their simplicity are suitable for
public health educations but have limitations that could be better
covered using nutrient balances. The main cause of developing the list
of food substitutes was the limitations in calculating nutrients in a
designed diet that currently could be run using applications. Patients
also by using self-management nutrition applications that based on the
nutrient balancing method shown they are ready to accept this method. A
well-designed application can make using nutrient balancing method which
is the future of diets possible. However, the main limitation is still
the needs for a big, validated, and accurate foods composition database
that needs to be developed.
Keywords : Diet, Food Groups, Nutrients, Diet therapy,
Nutrition