DIET@NET: Best Practice Guidelines for dietary assessment in health research

on behalf of the DIET@NET consortium

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    77 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    Background: Dietary assessment is complex, and strategies to select the most appropriate dietary assessment tool (DAT) in epidemiological research are needed. The DIETary Assessment Tool NETwork (DIET@NET) aimed to establish expert consensus on Best Practice Guidelines (BPGs) for dietary assessment using self-report. Methods: The BPGs were developed using the Delphi technique. Two Delphi rounds were conducted. A total of 131 experts were invited, and of these 65 accepted, with 48 completing Delphi round I and 51 completing Delphi round II. In all, a total of 57 experts from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia commented on the 47 suggested guidelines. Results: Forty-three guidelines were generated, grouped into the following four stages: Stage I. Define what is to be measured in terms of dietary intake (what? who? and when?); Stage II. Investigate different types of DATs; Stage III. Evaluate existing tools to select the most appropriate DAT by evaluating published validation studies; Stage IV. Think through the implementation of the chosen DAT and consider sources of potential biases. Conclusions: The Delphi technique consolidated expert views on best practice in assessing dietary intake. The BPGs provide a valuable guide for health researchers to choose the most appropriate dietary assessment method for their studies. These guidelines will be accessible through the Nutritools website, www.nutritools.org.

    Original languageEnglish
    Article number202
    JournalBMC Medicine
    Volume15
    Issue number1
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 15 Nov 2017

    Bibliographical note

    Funding Information:
    This work was supported by the UK Medical Research Council (Grant number MR/L02019X/1).

    Publisher Copyright:
    © 2017 The Author(s).

    Keywords

    • Dietary assessment methods
    • Guidelines
    • Nutrition
    • Nutritional epidemiology
    • Public health

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