coeliac watch • Gluten-free wholegrain cereals such as amaranth, buckwheat, corn and millet can help to increase fibre intake and people should be encouraged to opt for brown, multigrain or fibre versions of gluten-free breads, pasta, pizza bases, savoury biscuits and crackers. • Fruit, vegetables and pulses provide low calorie options to balance meals and provide healthy snacks throughout the day. Use of gluten-free substitute foods should be restricted to bread and pastas, while avoiding regular intakes of cakes, biscuits and puddings. • Coeliac UK produces a Keeping Healthy booklet which provides useful tips on maintaining a healthy weight when following a gluten-free diet. This can be downloaded from the members’ log-in area of our website. Nutritional composition of the gluten-free diet Coeliac UK conducted research into the nutritional adequacy of the gluten-free diet. This research can be found on the Food Standards Agency website at the address listed in the references below. This research showed that there is currently no evidence to suggest that individuals diagnosed with coeliac disease and established on a gluten-free diet have specific nutritional deficiencies compared to the general population. The systematic review did, however, highlight the poor quality of published research available in this area. References and further information 1 Dickey W and Bodkin S. (1998). Prospective study of body mass index in patients with coeliac disease. BMJ (317): 1290 2 Dickey W and Kearney N. (2006). Overweight in Coeliac Disease: Prevalence, clinical characteristics and effect of a gluten-free diet. American Journal of Gastroenterology (101): 2356 – 2359 Coeliac UK website www.coeliac.org.uk You can read the full nutritional adequacy report on the Food Standards Agency website http:// www.foodbase.org.uk/results.php?f_category_id=&f_report_id=301
glutenfreedom.info An independent listing of gluten-free products, resources and suppliers
into research by Dr Amelia Lake Research Dietitian Dr Amelia Lake trained and worked as a dietitian before becoming a researcher. She is currently a Post-doctoral Research Fellow. Amelia's work explores Obesogenic Environments; the concept that obesity is related to the environment. As well as academic writing Amelia writes regularly for the professional press.
My split personality: using qualitative and quantitative methods in exploring dietary change I think I have a bit of a split personality. There is nothing more exciting (in work that is) than sitting down to a clean data set and working through your analysis plan.
Statistical analysis is such a satisfying task, particularly when there are strong patterns of associations and clear significance in the results. However, in the field of nutrition, often numbers don’t explain the full story. For example, in looking at dietary behaviours, we want to know what people eat, but in order to understand the behaviour we also want to know why they eat a particular food or have a certain type of drink. On the other hand, there is nothing more fascinating than analysing open-ended questionnaire responses, interview data or focus group data. Gaining insight into an individual’s eating behaviours and habits is a privileged perspective into someone’s world. Exploring both the quantitative data of what people are eating alongside the reasons for their food choice (often using qualitative methods), is insightful and adds breadth and depth to our understanding of the data (1). Mixed methods Using both methods together is referred to as mixed methods. An example of using mixed methods is the ASH30 longitudinal study (2) which explored dietary change across the lifecourse. The ASH30 study collected dietary data at two time points from the same individuals in Northumberland, North East England at 11-12 years of age in 1980 and then 20 years later at age 32-33 years (2000). Dietary and anthropometric data was collected from over 200 individuals at both time points (3,5). When we re-visited this sample at age 32-33 years, we were interested in their perceptions and attributions of their dietary change, as well as how their diet had changed. In volume 111, issue 11 of The British Food Journal we have discussed the benefits of combining both the social and nutritional perspectives (using mixed methods) when exploring dietary change. Similar to when you are choosing which method (or methods) to use to collect dietary diet data, choosing which qualitative methods to use will very much depend on your sample population; are one-to-one interviews better, or would focus groups serve your purpose? For the purpose of this study, questionnaires were used with both open ended questions and closed questions. The openended questions provided rich data and were highly illustrative of individuals’ perceptions and attributions for their change in diet from adolescence to adulthood. The paper in The British Food Journal provides further examples of the importance of using mixed methods in understanding why an individual’s diet can change across the lifecourse. As for my split personality, enjoying both forms of data analysis is obviously a benefit – particularly in understanding our complex dietary behaviours. References 1 Lake AA, Hyland RM, Rugg-Gunn A, Mathers JC, Adamson AJ. Combining social and nutritional perspectives: from adolescence to adulthood (The ASH30 Study). British Food Journal. 2009;111(11). 2 Lake AA, Rugg-Gunn AJ, Hyland RM, Wood CE, Mathers JC, Adamson AJ. Longitudinal dietary change from adolescence to adulthood: perceptions, attributions and evidence. Appetite. 2004 2004/6;42(3):255-63. 3 Craigie AM, Matthews JNS, Rugg-Gunn AJ, Lake AA, Mathers JC, Adamson AJ. Raised adolescent body mass index predicts the development of adiposity and a central distribution of body fat in adulthood: a longitudinal study. Obesity Facts. 2009;2(3):150-6. 4 Lake AA, Adamson AJ, Craigie AM, Rugg-Gunn AJ, Mathers JC. Tracking of dietary intake and factors associated with dietary change from early adolescence to adulthood: The ASH30 Study. Obesity Facts. 2009;2(3):157-65. 5 Lake AA, Mathers JC, Rugg-Gunn AJ, Adamson AJ. Longitudinal change in food habits between adolescence (11-12 years) and adulthood (32-33 years): the ASH30 Study. Journal of Public Health. 2006 March 1, 2006;28(1):10-6.
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NHDmag.com Dec '09/Jan '10 - issue 50
