Special Feature: Dietary Guidelines for Americans: A Dietary Guide That Says It All

ABSTRACT The 2015 – 2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans provides guidance for choosing a healthy diet. There is a focus on preventing and alleviating the effects of diet-related chronic diseases. These include obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and stroke, among others. This article briefly reviews the primary guideline items that can be used to teach patients with respect to improving their diet. Clinical exercise physiologists who work with patients with chronic disease can use these guidelines for general discussions regarding a heart-healthy diet.

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Longitudinal analysis of intervention effects on temptations and stages of change for dietary fat using parallel process latent growth modeling

Journal of Health Psychology ◽

10.1177/1359105316679723 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 24 (5) ◽

pp. 572-585 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Leslie Ann D Brick ◽

Si Yang ◽

Lisa L Harlow ◽

Colleen A Redding ◽

James O Prochaska

Keyword(s):

Stages Of Change ◽

Daily Intake ◽

Rate Of Change ◽

Dietary Guidelines ◽

High Fat ◽

Latent Growth ◽

Intervention Effects ◽

Randomized Controlled ◽

Stage Of Readiness ◽

Dietary Guidelines For Americans

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend a 20–35 percent daily intake of fat. Resisting the temptation to eat high-fat foods, in conjunction with stage of readiness to avoid these foods, has been shown to influence healthy behavior change. Data ( N = 6516) from three randomized controlled trials were pooled to examine the relationships among direct intervention effects on temptations and stage of change for limiting high-fat foods. Findings demonstrate separate simultaneous growth processes in which baseline level of temptations, but not the rate of change in temptations, was significantly related to the change in readiness to avoid high-fat foods.

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Toward an Evidence-Based Definition and Classification of Carbohydrate Food Quality: An Expert Panel Report

Nutrients ◽

10.3390/nu13082667 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (8) ◽

pp. 2667

Author(s):

Kevin B. Comerford ◽

Yanni Papanikolaou ◽

Julie Miller Jones ◽

Judith Rodriguez ◽

Joanne Slavin ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Food Quality ◽

Diet Quality ◽

Expert Panel ◽

Present Report ◽

Food Group ◽

Dietary Guidelines ◽

Evidence Based ◽

Carbohydrate Quality ◽

Dietary Guidelines For Americans

Carbohydrate-containing crops provide the bulk of dietary energy worldwide. In addition to their various carbohydrate forms (sugars, starches, fibers) and ratios, these foods may also contain varying amounts and combinations of proteins, fats, vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals, prebiotics, and anti-nutritional factors that may impact diet quality and health. Currently, there is no standardized or unified way to assess the quality of carbohydrate foods for the overall purpose of improving diet quality and health outcomes, creating an urgent need for the development of metrics and tools to better define and classify high-quality carbohydrate foods. The present report is based on a series of expert panel meetings and a scoping review of the literature focused on carbohydrate quality indicators and metrics produced over the last 10 years. The report outlines various approaches to assessing food quality, and proposes next steps and principles for developing improved metrics for assessing carbohydrate food quality. The expert panel concluded that a composite metric based on nutrient profiling methods featuring inputs such as carbohydrate–fiber–sugar ratios, micronutrients, and/or food group classification could provide useful and informative measures for guiding researchers, policymakers, industry, and consumers towards a better understanding of carbohydrate food quality and overall healthier diets. The identification of higher quality carbohydrate foods could improve evidence-based public health policies and programming—such as the 2025–2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

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Defining Nutritional and Functional Niches of Legumes: A Call for Clarity to Distinguish a Future Role for Pulses in the Dietary Guidelines for Americans

Nutrients ◽

10.3390/nu13041100 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (4) ◽

pp. 1100

Author(s):

Chelsea Didinger ◽

Henry J. Thompson

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Health Care Professionals ◽

Weight Status ◽

Dietary Guidelines ◽

Health Concern ◽

Healthy Weight ◽

Food Groups ◽

Rich Diversity ◽

Dietary Guidelines For Americans ◽

Dietary Components

Legume food crops can contribute to the solution of diet-related public health challenges. The rich diversity of the botanical family Fabaceae (Leguminosae) allows legumes to fill numerous nutritional niches. Pulses (i.e., a subgroup of legumes including chickpeas, cowpeas, dry beans, dry peas, and lentils) are a nutrient-dense food that could play a key role in eliminating the dramatic underconsumption of dietary fiber and potassium, two dietary components of public health concern, all while maintaining a caloric intake that promotes a healthy weight status. However, incorrect use of terminology—in the commercial and scientific literature as well as in publications and materials prepared for the consuming public—creates confusion and represents a barrier to dissemination of clear dietary guideline messaging. The use of accurate terminology and a simple classification scheme can promote public health through differentiation among types of legumes, better informing the development and implementation of nutritional policies and allowing health care professionals and the public to capitalize on the health benefits associated with different legumes. Although inconsistent grouping of legumes exists across countries, the recently released 2020–2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) were chosen to illustrate potential challenges faced and areas for clarification. In the 2020–2025 DGA, pulses are included in two food groups: the protein food group and ‘beans, peas, lentils’ vegetable subgroup. To evaluate the potential of pulses to contribute to intake of key dietary components within calorie recommendations, we compared 100 kilocalorie edible portions of pulses versus other foods. These comparisons demonstrate the unique nutritional profile of pulses and the opportunity afforded by this type of legume to address public health concerns, which can be greatly advanced by reducing confusion through global harmonization of terminology.

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