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. 2015 Jun 15;181(12):979-88.
doi: 10.1093/aje/kwu461. Epub 2015 May 1.

Using Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Data to Estimate the Percentage of the Population Meeting US Department of Agriculture Food Patterns Fruit and Vegetable Intake Recommendations

Latetia V Moore, Kevin W Dodd, Frances E Thompson, Kirsten A Grimm, Sonia A Kim, Kelley S Scanlon

Using Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Data to Estimate the Percentage of the Population Meeting US Department of Agriculture Food Patterns Fruit and Vegetable Intake Recommendations

Latetia V Moore et al. Am J Epidemiol. .

Abstract

Most Americans do not eat enough fruits and vegetables with significant variation by state. State-level self-reported frequency of fruit and vegetable consumption is available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). However, BRFSS cannot be used to directly compare states' progress toward national goals because of incongruence in units used to measure intake and because distributions from frequency data are not reflective of usual intake. To help states track progress, we developed scoring algorithms from external data and applied them to BRFSS 2011 data to estimate the percentage of each state's adult population meeting US Department of Agriculture Food Patterns fruit and vegetable intake recommendations. We used 24-hour dietary recall data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2007-2010, to fit sex- and age-specific models that estimate probabilities of meeting recommendations as functions of reported consumption frequency, race/ethnicity, and poverty-income ratio adjusting for intraindividual variation. Regression parameters derived from these models were applied to BRFSS to estimate the percentage meeting recommendations. We estimate that 7%-18% of state populations met fruit recommendations and 5%-12% met vegetable recommendations. Our method provides a new tool for states to track progress toward meeting dietary recommendations.

Keywords: fruits; recommended intake; states; vegetables.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have no conflict of interests to declare.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Overview of method to estimate percent of the population meeting fruit intake recommendations National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, United States, 2007–2010, and Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, United States, 2011
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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