Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2008 Feb 22:8:71.
doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-8-71.

How effective is good domestic kitchen hygiene at reducing diarrhoeal disease in developed countries? A systematic review and reanalysis of the UK IID study

Anna Stenberg  1 , Clare Macdonald, Paul R Hunter
Affiliations

How effective is good domestic kitchen hygiene at reducing diarrhoeal disease in developed countries? A systematic review and reanalysis of the UK IID study

Anna Stenberg et al. BMC Public Health. .

Abstract

Background: To assess whether domestic kitchen hygiene is an important contributor to the development of diarrhoea in the developed world.

Methods: Electronic searches were carried out in October 2006 in EMBASE, MEDLINE, Web of Knowledge, Cochrane central register of clinical trials and CINAHL. All publications, irrespective of study design, assessing food hygiene practices with an outcome measure of diarrhoea were included in the review. All included studies underwent data extraction and the data was subsequently analysed. The analysis was conducted by qualitative synthesis of the results. Given the substantial heterogeneity in study design and outcome measures meta-analysis was not done. In addition the existing dataset of the UK IID study was reanalysed to investigate possible associations between self-reported diarrhoea and variables indicative of poor domestic kitchen hygiene

Results: Some 14 studies were finally included in subsequent analyses. Of the 14 studies included in this systematic review, 11 were case-control studies, 2 cross-sectional surveys, and 1 RCT. Very few studies identified any significant association with good environmental kitchen hygiene. Although some of the variables in the reanalysis of the UK IID study were statistically significant no obvious trend was seen.

Conclusion: The balance of the available evidence does not support the hypothesis that poor domestic kitchen hygiene practices are important risk factors for diarrhoeal disease in developed countries.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. World Health Organization World Health Report : 2004 : Changing History, World Health Organisation, Geneva. 2004.
    1. Scallan E, Majowicz SE, Hall G, Banerjee A, Bowman CL, Daly L, Jones T, Kirk MD, Fitzgerald M, Angulo FJ. Prevalence of diarrhoea in the community in Australia, Canada, Ireland and the United States. Int J Epidemiol. 2005;34:454–460. doi: 10.1093/ije/dyh413. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Wheeler JG, Sethi D, Cowden JM, Wall PG, Rodrigues LC, Tompkins DS, Hudson MJ, Roderick PJ. Study of infectious intestinal disease in England: rates in the community, presenting to general practice, and reported to national surveillance. Brit Med J. 1999;318:1046–1050. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Adak GK, Long SM, O'Brien SJ. Trends in indigenous foodborne disease and deaths, England and Wales: 1992 to 2000. Gut. 2002;51:832–841. doi: 10.1136/gut.51.6.832. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Mead PS, Slutsker L, Dietz V, McCaig LF, Bresee JS, Shapiro C, Griffin PM, Tauxe RV. Food-related illness and death in the United States. Emerg Infect Dis. 1999;5:607–625. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types