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Biomarker-based evaluation of two 24-h recalls for comparing usual fish, fruit and vegetable intakes across European centers in the EFCOVAL Study

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition volume 65, pages S38–S47 (2011)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Background/Objectives:

A standardized methodology is important to enable consistent monitoring of dietary intake across European countries. For this reason, we evaluated the comparability of the assessment of usual food intake collected with two non-consecutive computerized 24-h dietary recalls (24-HDRs) and a food propensity questionnaire (FPQ) among five European centers.

Subjects/Methods:

Two 24-HDRs using EPIC-Soft (the software developed to conduct 24-HDRs in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) Study) were performed to determine fish, fruit and vegetable (FV) consumed by 600 adults in Belgium (BE), the Czech Republic (CZ), France (FR), the Netherlands (NL) and Norway (NO) in a validation study. An FPQ was used to identify non-consumers. Information from the 24-HDRs and FPQ were used to estimate individual usual food intake by the Multiple Source Method (MSM). Blood samples were drawn to determine fatty acids in phospholipids and serum carotenoids as biomarkers of fish, and FV intake, respectively.

Results:

The pooled correlation between usual fish intake and eicosapentaenoic acid plus docosahexaenoic acid in phospholipids was 0.19 in men and 0.31 in women (P for heterogeneity >0.50) and center-specific correlations ranged between 0.08 (CZ) and 0.28 (BE and NO) in men, and between 0.19 (BE) and 0.55 (FR) in women. For usual FV intake, the pooled correlation with serum carotenoids was 0.31 in men and 0.40 in women (P for heterogeneity >0.10); the center-specific correlations varied between 0.07 (NO) and 0.52 (FR) in men, and between 0.25 (NL) and 0.45 (NO) in women.

Conclusion:

Two standardized 24-HDRs using EPIC-Soft and an FPQ appeared to be appropriate to rank individuals according to their fish and FV intake in a comparable way among five European centers.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the European Community funding under the Sixth Framework Program for the EFCOVAL Project (FOOD-CT-2006-022895). This document reflects only our views and the European Community is not liable for any use that may be made of the information contained therein. We thank all participants in this study.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Human Nutrition, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands

    S P Crispim, A Geelen, O W Souverein, P J M Hulshof, P van 't Veer & J H de Vries

  2. National Institute of Public Health, Brno, The Czech Republic

    J Ruprich & M Dofkova

  3. Department of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium

    I Huybrechts & W De Keyzer

  4. Dietary Exposure Assessment Group, International Agency for Research on Cancer, Lyon, France

    I Huybrechts & N Slimani

  5. Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, University College Ghent, Ghent, Belgium

    W De Keyzer

  6. Department of Nutrition, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    I T Lillegaard & L F Andersen

  7. Food Safety Department/Food Intake and Nutritional Epidemiology Unit, French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health Safety (ANSES), Maisons-Alfort, France

    L Lafay

  8. INSERM U907 (Laboratoire Dysfonctions Métaboliques et Diabetes, Mécanismes et Approches Thérapeutiques) Faculte de Médecine, Université de Nice Sophia-Antipolis, Nice, France

    A-S Rousseau

  9. National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), Bilthoven, The Netherlands

    M C Ocké

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  1. S P Crispim
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Correspondence to S P Crispim.

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Competing interests

JR received consulting fees from the Czech Technology Platform for food and healthy lifestyle. The remaining authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Contributors: SPC carried out data analyses and wrote the paper, taking into account comments from all co-authors. JHdV, AG and PvV designed and coordinated the validation study. OWS contributed to the statistical analyses. PJMH was responsible for laboratorial analyses. JHdV, AG, LL, A-SR, ITL, LFA, IH, WDK, JR, MD, MCO and NS were involved in the fieldwork and gave input on interpretation of results. All co-authors commented on the paper and approved the final version.

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Crispim, S., Geelen, A., Souverein, O. et al. Biomarker-based evaluation of two 24-h recalls for comparing usual fish, fruit and vegetable intakes across European centers in the EFCOVAL Study. Eur J Clin Nutr 65 (Suppl 1), S38–S47 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/ejcn.2011.86

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