vituliani
Case study 01

Eating without Guesswork.

A mobile app that turns the low-FODMAP diet into a simple traffic light: scan a product, log how you feel, and finally see which foods set off your gut.

Role Product designer
Scope Research → UI → system
Platform Android & iOS
Year 2025
Three screens of the IBS management app
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01 / The problem

Every meal is a bet you can lose for two days.

The low-FODMAP diet is the most effective way to manage IBS, and one of the hardest to follow. Safe portions differ per food, labels never mention FODMAPs, and the link between what you ate on Tuesday and how you felt on Thursday lives in someone's notes app.

3 interviews with people living with IBS
3 competitor apps torn apart
1 visual language: red, amber, green
02 / Who I designed for

Three people, three versions of the same fear.

Portrait of Anna Anna, 29 “I just want to know quickly if I can eat something without worrying.” Suffers from bloating after eating outNeeds fast, reliable food checks on the goRelies on mobile apps but finds them confusing
Portrait of Sophie Sophie, 35 “I try to track my food, but connecting meals with symptoms is too complicated.” Uses a notes app as a food diaryStruggles to see patterns between diet and symptomsNeeds effortless symptom tracking
Portrait of David David, 42 “There's too much information online, I don't know what to trust.” Recently diagnosed with IBSFeels overwhelmed by conflicting sourcesWants clear and simple guidance
Insight 01 A verdict is worth more than data. People want “yes / careful / no” in one second.
Insight 02 Logging dies when it feels like homework. Symptoms must be tappable, not typed.
Insight 03 Trust comes from sourcing. The diet's science has to be visible, not implied.
03 / Landscape

The data existed. The experience didn't.

Monash FODMAP Diet App logo
Monash FODMAP Diet App Developed by Monash University, the creators of the FODMAP diet.
Highly reliable scientific data, the official source of truth.
Outdated interface, difficult navigation, relatively high price.
Cara Care: IBS, FODMAP Tracker logo
Cara Care: IBS, FODMAP Tracker An app that combines food logging, symptom tracking, and diet guidance.
Holistic approach that combines multiple tools in one place.
Overloaded with features, which can overwhelm new users.
FODMAP Friendly App logo
FODMAP Friendly App Created by the certification body that tests and labels products as “FODMAP Friendly.”
Officially certified product database.
Limited food entries, unintuitive search, basic UI.

Each app owned one piece of it: credibility, tracking, or scanning. None of them made a decision easy in the aisle of a supermarket. That gap became the product.

04 / The core idea

One rule the whole app obeys.

Avoid High FODMAP. Likely to trigger symptoms, even in small portions.
Portion Safe up to a limit. The app names the exact serving size.
Safe Low FODMAP. Eat it in normal servings without second thoughts.

The same three colors label a food, a scanned product, an ingredient, and a symptom day, so reading the app never has to be learned twice.

05 / Foods

A library you read with your eyes, not your reading glasses.

Every food carries its verdict as a dot. Tap one and a sheet breaks the food down by portion and by sugar group (oligos, fructose, polyols, lactose), so a “no” always explains itself.

Category filters, search, and a colour legend pinned to the thumbPortion ladders instead of a single yes/no
Food library screen
Low FODMAP detail sheet
High FODMAP detail sheet
06 / Capture

Point the camera at dinner, get a verdict.

Three capture modes: packaging, recipe, or a plate of food. The AI proposes the ingredient list, the person corrects it, and only then does the analysis run. Editing before the verdict is what makes the result trustworthy.

Result leads with the headline, not the chemistryPer-ingredient breakdown for anyone who wants the why
Capture entry screen
Detected dish with editable ingredients
FODMAP analysis result
07 / Tracker

Logging in taps. Patterns for free.

A day is one screen: how you feel overall, then each symptom rated none / moderate / severe. No typing, no scales to interpret. Those taps roll up into weekly trend lines and a colour grid where a bad week is visible before it is described.

Same red, amber, green vocabulary as the food libraryWeekly grid built for a doctor's appointment
Daily symptom log
Symptom trend charts
Weekly symptom grid