Development of a food frequency questionnaire for assessing dietary intake in children and adolescents in South America

Abstract

Purpose: To describe the development process of a Food Frequency Questionnaire (FFQ) to assess dietaryintake in children and adolescents from South America.Methods: The FFQ was designed to be self-administered and to assess dietary intake over the past threemonths. Multiple approaches were considered to compile the food list, and 11 food groups were included.A food photo booklet was produced. Finally, considering both the basic core list and the country-specificfoods, the FFQ for Buenos Aires and Lima had a total of 63 items; there were 55 items for the FFQ inMedelin, 60 items for Montevideo, 58 items for Santiago, 67 items for Sao Paulo and 68 items for Teresina.Alcohol was also incorporated in the adolescents' FFQ.Results: The FFQ food items differed for each city to both maintain a common core and respect the foodavailability of each city. It was developed in Spanish and translated into Portuguese. A total of 345 childrenand 357 adolescents were considered for analysis.Conclusion: We developed a semi-quantitative, culturally appropriate FFQ to assess dietary intake in children and adolescents in South America. (AU)