National food intake assessment -- technologies to advance traditional methods

Authors: Moshfegh, Alanna; Rhodes, Donna; Martin, Carrie

Submitted to: Annual Review of Nutrition
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 12/22/2021
Publication Date: 8/22/2022
Citation: Moshfegh, A.J., Rhodes, D.G., Martin, C.L. 2022. National Food Intake Assessment: Technologies to Advance Traditional Methods. Annual Review of Nutrition. 42:401-422. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-nutr-062320-110636.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-nutr-062320-110636

Interpretive Summary: Dietary intake is an important factor for health promotion and disease prevention. National dietary surveillance of the U.S. population is essential for informing and evaluating national policies in food and nutrition. To ensure that policies are rational and effective requires an evidence-based approach dependent on the availability of accurate, comprehensive, and timely data. National dietary data are a contributing factor in critical policies and used for many different purposes and, therefore, requires continual innovations to improve the methods of data collection, quality, and relevance. National surveillance, designed to assess intakes representative of population groups and subgroups of individuals, is based on assessment of individuals. It requires a sample representative of the U.S. population, including individuals of all ages from diverse racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds. The eating behaviors of a population must also be considered in surveillance design. This paper critically evaluates the strength and limitations of current and newer methods in national dietary data collection, underscoring the use of technology and emerging technological innovations. The following foremost objectives are designated as essential for national dietary surveillance and served as guiding principles in the evaluation: capturing eating behaviors of a diverse population with a standardized validated method, compelling respondent participation to collect accurate dietary information, ensuring a dietary database to support collection, and guaranteeing timely data that is transparent and publicly available.

Technical Abstract: National dietary data are a contributing factor in critical policies and used for many different purposes and, therefore, requires continual innovations to improve the methods of data collection, quality, and relevance. National dietary surveillance requires a sample representative of the U.S. population, including individuals of all ages from diverse racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds. The eating behaviors of a population must also be considered in surveillance design. The objective of this research is to critically evaluate the strength and limitations of current and newer methods in national dietary data collection, underscoring the use of technology and emerging technological innovations. The USDA Automated Multiple-Pass Method (AMPM) used for collecting dietary intakes in What We Eat In America (WWEIA), NHANES and its companion Food and Nutrient Database for Dietary Studies, used to convert reported foods and beverages from AMPM into gram amounts and determine nutrient intakes, are explained with attention to their technology applications. Data processing and review for WWEIA data are also detailed. Strengths and limitations of these components from the point of technology are summarized. Dietary assessment using web-based, image-based, and emerging novel technology applications are also evaluated based on the designated guiding principles for national dietary surveillance: capturing eating behaviors of a diverse population with a standardized validated method, compelling respondent participation to collect accurate dietary information, ensuring a dietary database to support collection, and guaranteeing timely data that is transparent and publicly available.