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Combining nutrient intake from food/beverages and vitamin/mineral supplements

Publication: Health Reports 2010:21(4) www.statcan.gc.ca/healthreports

Authors: Didier Garriguet

Data: 2004 Canadian Community Health Survey - Nutrition

Nutrient total consumption

Nutrients come not only from food and beverages, but also from vitamin and mineral supplements. Thus, estimates of the total consumption of any nutrient must include supplement intake.

Combining intakes

This paper compares four ways of combining food/beverages and vitamin/mineral supplements to determine total nutrient intake.

  1. Adding average supplement intake to 24-hr recall before adjusting for within-individual variation the total intake;
  2. Adjusting for within-individual variation food/beverages and adding vitamin/mineral supplements to the individual usual intake;
  3. Dividing the population into supplement consumers or not of a given nutrient before applying method 1 on each subpopulation;
  4. Dividing the population into supplement consumers or not of a given nutrient before applying method 2 on each subpopulation.

Based on these comparisons, methods 3 and 4 emerge as being easier to interpret.

Full article

For more information about this article, contact Didier Garriguet (1-613-951-7187; Didier.Garriguet@statcan.gc.ca), Health Analysis Division, Statistics Canada.