JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Objective:

The study objective was to assess the extent of agreement between self-administered and the interviewer-administered 24-hour dietary recalls in Russian adults and school-aged children using an adaptation of an online 24-hour recall tool.

Methods:

The present online dietary assessment tool is based on a previously validated online dietary assessment tool, which has been adapted to the Russian diet and language. A randomized 50% of participants completed a self-administered online dietary recall first, followed by an interviewer-administered 24-hour dietary recall later that same day, and the other 50% of participants - vice-versa. Following at least one week wash out period, during Visit 2, participants completed the two dietary recalls in the opposite order. Statistical analysis was carried out on the intake results from both methods for the two recalls.

Results:

A total of 194 participants, who completed the study, had available data on the two assessments by the two methods. In total, 28 nutrients and energy intakes were analyzed during the study. Nutrient intakes from both methods were not statistically different from each other for Recalls 1 and 2 in younger children. In older children, there were significant differences between the two methods in protein intakes (P=0.013) for Recall 1, and carbohydrate (P=0.022) and sodium intakes (P=0.011) for Recall 2. In adults, significant differences were observed between the two methods for several nutrients, including energy (kcal) (P=0.015) and total sugar (P=0.04). A moderate to excellent reliability between the two methods was observed in younger children. In older children, a moderate to good reliability was observed, with the exception of sodium, which indicated poor reliability. In adults, moderate to excellent reliability between both methods was observed with the exception of vitamins B1, B2 and B6, and pantothenic acid. The level of agreement between the categorization of estimates into thirds of the intake distribution for the average of the two days was good, since the percentages of participants, categorized into the same tertile of intake were ˃50%, and the percentages of participants, categorized into the opposite tertile of intake were <10%. Most of the Bland—Altman plots for the differences of energy and nutrients intakes were within the limits of agreement. Among all age groups from 9.5 to 1.6% of data plots were outside the limits of agreement. The measured anthropometric data (BMI, weight, and height) tended to be greater than self-reported (with the exception for height in the older school age children and adult cohorts). The majority of respondents were very positive in their evaluation of the online dietary assessment tool.

Conclusions:

Overall the online dietary assessment tool performs well when compared with a face-to-face interviewer-administered 24-hour dietary recall and provides comparable estimates of energy and nutrient intakes.