Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Original Communication
  • Published:

Population attitudes towards changing dietary habits and reliance on general practitioners in Spain

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition volume 53, pages s58–s61 (1999)Cite this article

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the relationship between population attitudes towards modifying food behaviour and reliance on General Practitioners (GPs) as nutrition educators.

Design: Personal interview in a random sample of the general population of the Canary Islands as part of the Canary Islands Nutrition Survey.

Subjects: 1747 individuals aged 6–74 y.

Main outcome measures: Attitudes towards changing food behaviour and reliance on GPs.

Results: Response rate was 67%. Physicians were the most reliable source of nutrition information with 79% of the population considering them as highly reliable. More than 60% of the population showed a favourable attitude towards increasing fruit and vegetables and towards decreasing alcohol, sugar and pastries. Reliance on GPs was associated with better attitudes towards increasing fruits, decreasing meat, pastries, sugar and losing weight.

Conclusions: Population attitudes towards changing certain dietary behaviours were associated with having the greatest reliance on GPs.

Sponsorship: Supported by a Grant from the Canary Islands Health Service, Autonomous Government of the Canary Islands, Spain.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Similar content being viewed by others

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Community Nutrition Research Group, School of Health Sciences, University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, PO BOX 550, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 35080, Spain

    LL Serra-Majem, JR Calvo, ML Male & P Lainez

  2. University Hospital Materno Insular, Canary Islands Health Service, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 85016, Spain

    LL Serra-Majem

  3. Community Nutrition Research Group, Scientific Park of Barcelona, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, 08028, Spain

    LL Serra-Majem & L Ribas

Authors
  1. LL Serra-Majem
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. JR Calvo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. ML Male
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. L Ribas
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. P Lainez
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to LL Serra-Majem.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Serra-Majem, L., Calvo, J., Male, M. et al. Population attitudes towards changing dietary habits and reliance on general practitioners in Spain. Eur J Clin Nutr 53 (Suppl 2), s58–s61 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ejcn.1600804

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ejcn.1600804

Keywords

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links