Differences in diet quality and socioeconomic patterning of diet quality across ethnic groups: cross-sectional data from the HELIUS Dietary Patterns study.
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Publication Date
2020-03Journal Title
European journal of clinical nutrition
ISSN
0954-3007
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
Volume
74
Issue
3
Pages
387-396
Language
eng
Type
Article
This Version
AM
Physical Medium
Print-Electronic
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Yau, A., Adams, J., White, M., & Nicolaou, M. (2020). Differences in diet quality and socioeconomic patterning of diet quality across ethnic groups: cross-sectional data from the HELIUS Dietary Patterns study.. European journal of clinical nutrition, 74 (3), 387-396. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-019-0463-4
Abstract
Background/objectives Socioeconomic inequalities in diet quality are consistently reported, but few studies have investigated whether and how such inequalities vary across ethnic groups. This study aimed to examine differences in diet quality and socioeconomic patterning of diet quality across ethnic groups.
Subjects/methods Cross-sectional data from the HELIUS study were used. Dutch, South-Asian Surinamese, African Surinamese, Ghanaian, Turkish and Moroccan adults (aged 18-70 years) were randomly sampled stratified by ethnicity. Dietary intake was estimated among a sub-sample (n=4602) from 200-item, ethnic-specific food frequency questionnaires, and diet quality assessed using the Dutch Healthy Diet Index 2015 (DHD15-Index). Wald tests were used to compare non-Dutch and Dutch participants. Adjusted linear regression models were used to examine differences in DHD15-Index by three indicators of socioeconomic position: educational level, occupational status and perceived financial difficulties. All analyses were stratified by sex.
Results Dutch participants had lower median DHD15-Index than most ethnic minority participants (P<0.001). Lower educational level was associated with lower DHD15-Index among Dutch men (Ptrend<0.0001), South-Asian Surinamese men (Ptrend=0.01), Dutch women (Ptrend=0.0001), African Surinamese women (Ptrend=0.002) and Moroccan women (Ptrend=0.04). Lower occupational status was associated with lower DHD15-Index in Dutch men, -7.8 (95% CI -11.7, -3.9) and all women ( -4.4 to -8.8), except Turkish women. DHD15-Index was not associated with perceived financial difficulties in most groups.
Conclusions We observed variations in diet quality across ethnic groups. Low socioeconomic position was not consistently associated with poor diet quality in all ethnic groups. This may be due to ethnicity-specific retention of traditional diets, irrespective of socioeconomic position.
Sponsorship
The HELIUS study is conducted by the Academic Medical Center Amsterdam and the Public Health Service of Amsterdam. Both organisations provided core support of HELIUS. The HELIUS study is also funded by the Dutch Heart Foundation, the Netherlands Organization for Health Research and Development (ZonMw), the European Union (FP-7), and the European Fund for the Integration of non-EU immigrants (EIF). The HELIUS-Dietary Pattern study is funded by Netherlands Organization for Health Research and Development (ZonMw; Project number: 50-51600-98-031). This work was undertaken by the Centre for Diet and Activity Research (CEDAR), a UKCRC Public Health Research Centre of Excellence. Funding from Cancer Research UK, the British Heart Foundation, the Economic and Social Research Council, the Medical Research Council, the National Institute for Health Research, and the Wellcome Trust, under the auspices of the UK Clinical Research Collaboration, is gratefully acknowledged. The funders had no role in the study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, or writing, nor in the decision to submit the article for publication.
Funder references
MRC (MR/K023187/1)
Wellcome Trust (087636/Z/08/Z)
ESRC (ES/G007462/1)
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-019-0463-4
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/294209
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