Nutritional Epidemiology /

Abstract

This book is written for those seeking to understand the relation between diet and long-term health and disease. A basic premise is that our understanding of biologic mechanisms remains far too incomplete to predict confidently the ultimate consequences of eating a particular food or nutrient. Thus, epidemiologic studies directly relating intake of dietary factors to risk of death or disease among humans play a critical complementary role to laboratory investigations. A great expansion of the literature in nutritional epidemiology and the development of a firmer quantitative basis for this science have occurred in the last ten years. Most importantly, the degree of variation in dietary factors among individuals has been quantified in many populations, standardized questionnaires have been developed for use in large epidemiologic studies, and the degree of accuracy of these questionnaires has been documented. Although most of the questions regarding the relations of dietary factors to disease remain unanswered, the foundations for obtaining this information have been laid. Nutritional Epidemiology represents an attempt to consolidate the substantial new methodologic information and experience that have been developed during the last decade.