Web-based studies: The future in nutritional epidemiology (and overarching epidemiology) for the benefit of public health?

Comparison of the sociodemographic characteristics of the large NutriNet-Santé e-cohort with French Census data: the issue of volunteer bias revisited

“…18 The study was conceived as a very large, population-based e-cohort that is well positioned to help untangle the multifaceted aetiological role of nutrition via accurately measured dietary intake and a plethora of potential confounders. 30 An important limitation of the NutriNet-Santé study, stemming from the recruitment strategy, is the lack of information on participation and refusal rates. Next, authors have evoked the issue of multiple submissions in online surveys.…”

Dietary assessment methods in epidemiologic studies

“…Most state-of-the-art technologies must give enormous potentials to be adapted as a major dietary assessment tool in various epidemiological studies to the conservative open-ended methods depending on paper and pencil surveys [19,20,24,32,33]. Table 2 summarizes the strengths and limitations of dietary assessment methods with newer techniques.…”

“…Software development and the required hardware need high costs in the early stage of the research. However, only if they are prepared, DRs and 24HRs with innovative technologies may reduce their costs and resources for organizing study as well as collecting and handling data, improve consistency of data, collect data in real time and calculate dietary intakes automatically, and allow respondents to focus on dietary assessment [20,23,25,32,33]. While the feasibility of multiple 24HRs and DRs in epidemiological studies has considerably improved with the help of these new technologies, there are still some limitations.…”

Dietary assessment methods for older persons

“…These methods offer new opportunities to facilitate dietary assessment and to reach populations that are up to now difficult to address, for example patients with limited mobility, along with substantial logistical and cost advantages [30,31]. Their acceptance by older persons is presently unknown, and the future will show if these innovative assessment technologies may be helpful for dietary assessment in the older population.…”