Dietary assessment of pregnant women in Sheffield, UK.

As a part of an on-going project to develop a dietary risk assessment tool for low
income pregnant women, we evaluated the performance of a modified version of
an existing semi-quantified food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) in terms of
validity and assessed the nutrient intakes of a sample of English speaking,
Caucasian pregnant women living in economically deprived and non-deprived
electoral wards of Sheffield. Two statistical techniques were also applied to on
energy-adjusted data for identification of discriminatory food items among
women living in economically deprived wards.
A critical assessment of the influence of individual and social factors on food
choice, of the dietary intakes of different socioeconomic groups, of the
importance of nutrition prior and during pregnancy and of methods of dietary
assessment and associated methodological concerns was undertaken.
One-hundred and twenty three pregnant women were recruited for the validation
study, which were also included in the main study analysis together with another
sub sample of 127 pregnant women. In total 250 pregnant women aged 15 to 43
years provided complete dietary information, of which 174 resided in the 40%
most deprived electoral wards and 76 in other wards within Sheffield.
The validity of the FFQ was tested against two 24-hour recalls. The FFQ
overestimated nutrient intakes but an acceptable agreement between the two
assessment methods was observed. Macronutrient intakes of the Sheffield
women were similar to other UK pregnancy studies. Mean intakes of calcium,
iron, folate and vitamin C however, were relatively lower. Subgroup comparisons
showed wide variations in nutrient intakes. The results of regression and
discriminant analyses identified food items which might be of importance in the
evaluation of the habitual diet of the low income group of pregnant women in
Sheffield.
The study findings confirm that the FFQ is a valid tool for categorising pregnant
women according to dietary intake and that the diet of pregnant women in
Sheffield is possibly characterised by low intakes of important nutrients for
pregnancy. This study makes an important contribution to future planning and
development of interventions for pregnant populations in Sheffield and similar
conurbations.