Hygienic assessment of daily dietary intake of medical students

Abstract

It is difficult to overestimate the relevance of the study of the actual nutrition of students of higher education institutions, as nutrition is the most important component of healthy lifestyle. The aim of the study was to perform hygienic assessment of the medical university students’ daily dietary intake. The study involved 1200 students of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd years at the department of general medicine, pediatric department and dental department. The method of studying actual nutrition with the help of an electronic food diary, where the subjects entered information about the foods consumed during the day, was chosen to record actual nutrition facts. Data processing showed that the daily nutritional intake of students at all the studied faculties was characterized by reduced caloric content, reduced intake of nutritional substances, lack of systematization of meals and eating mainly in the evening. Thus, hygienic assessment of the medical students’ daily dietary intake revealed shortcomings in the organization of nutrition of this population group, which should be eliminated in order to preserve and improve the health of future specialists. In subsequent studies, one would need to assess the nutrition of different gender groups in order to trace the emerging nutritional stereotypes in groups of young men and women, taking into account the differences in age and the chosen specialty.