What are the standards in use (for nutrient recommendations) in the United States and Canada? Who develops and publishes it?

Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI).
Developed and published by a committee of nutrition experts from the US and Canada.

What is the Dietary Reference Intakes?

It's a set of four lists of values for measuring the nutrient intakes of healthy people in the US and Canada.

What are the Four Lists of values of the DRI?

1. Estimated Average Requirements (EAR)
2. Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDA)
3. Adequate Intakes (AI)
4. Tolerable Upper Intake Levels (UL)

What are Daily Values?

They are another set of nutrient standards useful for the person trying to make a wise choice among packaged food. They are on food labels and restaurant signs.

Daily values are based on a ...?

2000 calorie diet

What are the two sets of values that individuals may use for their own nutrient intake goals (based on DRI)?

1. Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDA)
2. Adequate Intakes (AI)

Which value forms the indisputable bedrock of the DRI and why? Whose needs does it meet?

RDA- because they derive from solid experimental evidence and reliable observations--they are expected to meet the needs of almost all healthy people.

What are AI values based on?

They are not based on scientific evidence but educated guesswork. Whenever the DRI committee finds insufficient evidence to generate an RDA, they establish an AI value instead.

The RDA and AI values are collectively referred to as...?

The DRI recommended intakes

What does the EAR do?

The EAR establishes nutrient requirements for given life stages and gender groups that researchers and nutrition policy makers use in their work. It is the average daily nutrient intake estimated to meet the requirement of half of the healthy individuals in a particular life stage and gender group; used in nutrition research and policy making and is the basis upon which RDA values are set.

What is the basis upon which RDA values are set?

the EAR

What is the RDA?

It is nutrient intake goals for individuals; the average daily nutrient intake level that meets the needs of nearly all (97-98%) healthy people in a particular life stage and gender group.

The RDA is derived from...?

From the EAR

What is the UL

The Tolerable UPPER Intake Levels are used to identify potentially toxic levels of nutrient intake. Indispensable to consumers who take supplements or consume foods and beverages to which vitamins or minerals have been added. It's the highest average daily nutrient intake level that is likely to pose no risk of toxicity to almost all healthy individuals of a particular life stage and gender group.

What is the AMDR?

It's the Acceptable MacroNutrient Distribution Range which are values set by the DRI that are values for carbohydrate, fat and protein expressed as percentages of total daily calorie intake; ranges of intakes set for the energy-yielding nutrients that are sufficient to provide adequate total energy and nutrients while reducing the risk of chronic disease.

What are the AMDR limits for carbs, proteins and fats?

carbs= 45-65 percent of calories
fat= 20-35 percent
protein= 10-35 percent

Does the DRI acknowledge differences between individuals? How?

It has made separate recommendations for specific groups of people--men, women, pregnant women, lactating women, infants, and children. OR illness, smoking, vegetarianism.

On average, a person should try to get what percent of the DRI recommended intake for every nutrient?

100%

DRI values are based these 5 things...

1. available scientific research
2. based on the concepts of probability and risk (risk of toxins, probability of deficiency)
3. Recommendations for optimal intakes, not minimum requirements.
4. values are set in reference to certain indicators of nutrient adequacy such as blood nutrient concentrations, normal growth and reduction of certain chronic diseases or other disorders.
5. values reflect daily intakes to be achieved, on average over time. They assume that intakes will vary from day to day and are set high enough to ensure that the body's nutrient stores will meet nutrient needs during periods of inadequate intakes lasting several days to months, depending on the nutrient.

The DRI apply to...

Healthy people only

What is a balance study?

It's a laboratory study in which a person is fed a controlled diet and the intake and excretion of a nutrient are measured.

Balance studies are only valid for...? Why?

Only valid for nutrients like calcium (chemical elements) that do not change while they are in the body.

What is a requirement? How is it different from the DRI?

It is the amount of a nutrient that will just prevent the development of specific deficiency signs; distinguished from the DRI recommended intake value, which is a generous allowance with a margin of safety.

What is the EER?

It is the Estimated Energy Requirement which is the average dietary energy intake predicted to maintain energy balance in a healthy adult of a certain age, gender, weight, height and level of physical activity consistent with good health.

The EER is set at a level predicted to...?

Predicted to maintain body weight for an individual of a particular age, gender, height, weight and physical activity level consistent with good health

Daily values are ideal for allowing comparisons among foods but they cannot serve as...?

They cannot serve as nutrient intake goals for individuals cause they are set at the highest nutrient needs among people from children of age 4 through again adults. ie. the daily value for iron is 18mg, an amount that far exceeds a man's RDA or 8mg but meets a young woman's high need.

The USDA Dietary Guidelines for Americans offer science-based advice to help people ages...?

2 and older

What are their key recommendations? (4)

1. Balancing calories to manage weight
2. Foods and food components to reduce (reduce intakes of certain foods such as sodium, saturated and trans fatty acids etc.
3.Foods and nutrients to increase: ie fruits vegs, grains, low fat milk, seafood
4.Building Healthy eating patterns-meet nutrient nees while reducing the risk of food-borne illness.

What is the Healthy Eating Index?

It is a measure that assesses how well a diet meets the recommendations of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the USDA Food Patterns.

The USDA's food group plan does what?

It's a diet planning tool that sorts foods into groups based on their nutrient content and then specifies that people should eat certain minimum numbers of servings of foods from each group

What are the seven food groups?

1. Fruits
2. Vegetables
3. Grains
4. Protein Foods
5. Milk and Milk Products
6. Oils
7. Solid Fats and added sugars

What is the exchange system?

It's a different type of planning tool developed for use by those with diabetes. It organizes foods with respect to their nutrient content and calories. Foods on any single exchange list can be used interchangeably. The exchange system focuses on controlling the carb, fat, protein and energy (calories) in the diet.

What is the discretionary calories allowance?

sets the upper limit for calories from added sugars and solid fats in the USDA Food Patterns.