Dietary N-nitroso compounds are carcinogens synthesized during food processing from two main classes of precursors, oxides of nitrogen and amines or amides. Quantification of the dietary intake of N-nitroso compounds is significant to human cancers, including those of the stomach and upper gastro-intestinal tract, colon, and brain. Previous studies investigating these cancers primarily used proxy estimates of N-nitroso intake and not a full and complete database. In this report, we describe the development of a database to be used in conjunction with a food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) or twenty-four hour dietary records. Published analytical data for N-nitroso compounds were compiled and evaluated for inclusion in the database. The final database consisted of 23 different Nnitroso compounds for 500 foods from 39 different food subgroups. Next, database foods were matched to foods in a standard FFQ by imputation, or calculated value, or assumed zero. Using the FFQ modified with N-nitroso values, we evaluated the ability to compute N-nitroso intakes for a sample of healthy control subjects of cancer epidemiological studies. N-nitroso content of food items ranged from <0.01μg/100 g. to 142 μg/100 g and the richest sources were sausage, smoked meats, bacon, and luncheon meats. The database is useful to quantify N-nitroso intake for observational and epidemiological studies.
Objective
To determine if fruit and vegetable (FV) commercials have an impact on preschool children’s preferences for specific FV.
Design
A year of extensive formative assessment was conducted to develop two 30-second commercials; “Judy Fruity” promoted apples and bananas and “Reggie Veggie” promoted broccoli and carrots. The commercials were embedded into a 15-minute TV program. FV preferences were assessed before and after four exposures to each of the commercials.
Setting/Participants
One hundred eighty-three preschool children (39% African-American; 61% Hispanic-American) from four Head Start centers in Houston, Texas.
Main Outcome/Analysis
A general linear model was used to assess whether FV preferences were significantly higher in the treatment group than the control group, controlling for baseline FV preferences, age, race and intervention dose in the model.
Results
There was a significantly higher preference for broccoli and carrots (p = 0.02) in the intervention group compared to the control group after multiple exposures to the vegetable commercial.
Conclusions/Implications
Data suggest that commercials promoting vegetables may be an effective strategy to influence young children’s preferences for vegetables. This may not be the case with fruit preferences which are already high in this age group.
N-nitroso compounds are recognized as important dietary carcinogens. Accurate assessment of N-nitroso intake is fundamental to advancing research regarding its role with cancer. Previous studies have not used a quantitative database to estimate their intake. To address this gap a database of N-nitroso values was developed in conjunction with an existing food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). The purpose of this paper is to report on the relative validity of the FFQ instrument modified to estimate N-nitroso compounds. Intake estimates of 23 N-nitroso compounds from FFQ were compared with those from seven days of food records (7DFR) in a cross-sectional study conducted from January 2005 through June 2006. A sample of 98 healthy adult subjects (50.42 ± 12.84 years) completed a FFQ and then recorded foods and beverages consumed (7DFR). Crude and energy-adjusted N-nitroso compounds intakes were significantly higher in the FFQ than the 7DFR(P < 0.001). Spearman correlations for crude and energy-adjusted N-nitroso intakes ranged from 0.004 to 0.48. By tertiles of N-ntiroso compounds, there was moderate agreement (Kappa >0.30) for five compounds. Higher estimates of N-nitroso compounds by FFQ was explained by a greater proportion of subjects who reported eating foods high in N-nitroso compounds on FFQ than reported on 7DFR. The modified FFQ with N-nitroso values is a useful tool for assessing N-nitroso intakes relative to a group, and captures all food items with N-nitroso compounds including those foods with high concentrations and eaten sporadically.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.