Recently, dietary pattern analysis has emerged as an alternative and complementary approach to examining the relationship between diet and the risk of chronic diseases. Instead of looking at individual nutrients or foods, pattern analysis examines the effects of overall diet. Conceptually, dietary patterns represent a broader picture of food and nutrient consumption, and may thus be more predic...

Women (n 160) aged 50 to 65 years were asked to weigh their food for 4 d on four occasions over the period of 1 year, using the PETRA (Portable Electronic Tape Recorded Automatic) scales. Throughout the year, they were asked to complete seven other dietary assessment methods: a simple 24 h recall, a structured 24 h recall with portion size assessments using photographs, two food-frequency quest...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate measurement error structure in dietary assessment instruments and to investigate its implications for nutritional studies, using urinary nitrogen excretion as a reference biomarker for protein intake. DESIGN The dietary assessment methods included different food-frequency questionnaires (FFQs) and such conventional dietary-report reference instruments as a series of 24-h...

There is a contradiction between the perceptions held by different sectors of the Establishment with regard to the questions of hunger and nutrition in Brazil. On the one hand, the flagship of the present Brazilian government's social policy is the "Fome Zero" program. This program is based on the notion that the condition of hunger is socially relevant in this country. On the other hand, the s...

Twin studies have long been recognized for their value in learning about the aetiology of disease and specifically for their potential for separating genetic effects from environmental effects. The recent upsurge of interest in life-course epidemiology and the study of developmental influences on later health has provided a new impetus to study twins as a source of unique insights. Twins are of...

the risk of mortality: impact of cardiorespiratory fitness. Int J Epidemiol 2010;39:197–209. 3 World Health Organization and Food and Agriculture Organizations of the United Nations. Diet, Nutrition, and the Prevention of Chronic Disease. Report of a Joint WHO/FAO Expert Consultation. Report 916. Geneva: World Health Organization, 2003. 4 Hu FB. Dietary pattern analysis: a new direction in nutr...

It is a pleasure to comment on the valuable article by Dahm et al. (1) in this issue of the Journal and to provide my perspective on research needs and opportunities for progress in the challenging nutritional epidemiology research area. In doing so, I would like to first offer a tribute to the late Dr Sheila Rodwell (Bingham), senior author of the article by Dahm et al. For some decades, Dr Bi...

Exposure measurement error is a problem in many epidemiological studies, including those using biomarkers and measures of dietary intake. Measurement error typically results in biased estimates of exposure-disease associations, the severity and nature of the bias depending on the form of the error. To correct for the effects of measurement error, information additional to the main study data is...

Motivated by an important biomarker study in nutritional epidemiology, we consider the combination of the linear mixed measurement error model and the linear seemingly unrelated regression model, hence Seemingly Unrelated Measurement Error Models. In our context, we have data on protein intake and energy (caloric) intake from both a food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) and a biomarker, and wish t...

Semicontinuous data in the form of a mixture of a large portion of zero values and continuously distributed positive values frequently arise in many areas of biostatistics. This article is motivated by the analysis of relationships between disease outcomes and intakes of episodically consumed dietary components. An important aspect of studies in nutritional epidemiology is that true diet is uno...