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How well do Australian women comply with dietary guidelines?

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journal contribution
posted on 2004-01-01, 00:00 authored by Kylie BallKylie Ball, G Mishra, C Thane, A Hodge
Objective: To investigate the proportion of middle-aged Australian women meeting national dietary recommendations and its variation according to selected sociodemographic and behavioural characteristics.

Design: This cross-sectional population-based study used a food-frequency questionnaire to investigate dietary patterns and compliance with 13 commonly promoted dietary guidelines among a cohort of middle-aged women participating in the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health.

Setting: Nation-wide community-based survey.

Subjects: A total of 10 561 women aged 50–55 years at the time of the survey in 2001.

Results: Only about one-third of women complied with more than half of the guidelines, and only two women in the entire sample met all 13 guidelines examined. While guidelines for meat/fish/poultry/eggs/nuts/legumes and ‘extra’ foods (e.g. ice cream, chocolate, cakes, potatoes, pizza, hamburgers and wine) were met well, large percentages of women (68–88%) did not meet guidelines relating to the consumption of breads, cereal-based foods and dairy products, and intakes of total and saturated fat and iron. Women working in lower socio-economic status occupations, and women living alone or with people other than a partner and/or children, were at significantly increased risk of not meeting guidelines.

Conclusions: The present results indicate that a large proportion of middle-aged Australian women are not meeting dietary guidelines. Without substantial changes in their diets, and help in making these changes, current national guidelines appear unachievable for many women.


History

Journal

Public health nutrition

Volume

7

Issue

3

Pagination

443 - 452

Publisher

CABI Publishing

Location

Wallingford, England

ISSN

1368-9800

eISSN

1475-2727

Language

eng

Notes

Published online by Cambridge University Press 02 Jan 2007

Publication classification

C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2004, CAB International