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. 2025 Jul 5;35(7):305-312.
doi: 10.2188/jea.JE20240293. Epub 2025 Apr 30.

Validity of a Self-administered Food Frequency Questionnaire for Genomic and Omics Research Among Pregnant Women: The Tohoku Medical Megabank Project Birth and Three-Generation Cohort Study

Keiko Murakami  1 , Misako Nakadate  2 , Taku Obara  1   3   4 , Misato Aizawa  3 , Ippei Takahashi  3 , Mami Ishikuro  1   3 , Aoi Noda  1   3   4 , Hisashi Ohseto  3 , Noriyuki Iwama  1   3   4 , Masatoshi Saito  3   4 , Ribeka Takachi  5 , Shiori Sugawara  6 , Yudai Yonezawa  7 , Takahiro Yamashita  7 , Shigenori Suzuki  7 , Junko Ishihara  2   8 , Masayuki Yamamoto  1 , Shinichi Kuriyama  1   3   9
Affiliations

Validity of a Self-administered Food Frequency Questionnaire for Genomic and Omics Research Among Pregnant Women: The Tohoku Medical Megabank Project Birth and Three-Generation Cohort Study

Keiko Murakami et al. J Epidemiol. .

Abstract

Background: The Tohoku Medical Megabank Project has initiated the Birth and Three-Generation Cohort Study (TMM BirThree Cohort Study) including genomic and omics investigations and conducted a self-administered food frequency questionnaire with the response option "constitutionally unable to eat or drink it" for individual food items (TMM-FFQ) for pregnant women. This study evaluated the validity of the TMM-FFQ among pregnant women.

Methods: Participants comprised 122 pregnant women aged ≥20 years residing in Miyagi Prefecture who completed weighed food records (WFRs) for 3 days as reference intake and the TMM-FFQ during mid-pregnancy. Correlations between nutrient or food group intakes based on the WFR and the TMM-FFQ were calculated using Spearman's rank correlation coefficients (CCs), adjusting for energy intake and correcting for random within-individual variation of WFR. Cross-classification was also conducted according to quintiles using the WFR and TMM-FFQ data.

Results: The percentages of participants who chose the "constitutionally unable to eat or drink it" option were >3% for seven food and drink items. CCs were >0.30 for 31 nutrients; the median across energy and 44 nutrients was 0.41. CCs were >0.30 for 14 food groups; the median across 20 food groups was 0.35. The median percentages of cross-classification into exact plus adjacent quintiles and extreme quintiles were 63.1% and 3.3% for energy and nutrients and 61.9% and 4.1% for food groups, respectively.

Conclusion: The validity of the TMM-FFQ compared with the WFR was reasonable for certain nutrients and food groups among pregnant women in the TMM BirThree Cohort Study.

Keywords: Japan; food frequency questionnaire; genomic and omics research; pregnant women; validity.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of interest: KAGOME Co., Ltd. provided support in the form of salaries for authors Y.Y., T.Y., and S.S. The other authors declare they have no conflict of interest with respect to this research study and paper.

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