Last update:
07-Jul-2004

In contemporary Greece, the face of malnutrition has changed. New deficiency syndromes have emerged (e.g. folic acid in relation to neural tube defects), but most nutrition-related disorders can now be attributed to nutritional excesses and qualitative aberrations. For this reason monitoring the food habits of the Greek population is essential. This review aims at presenting the methodology for designing and undertaking a nutritional survey. Sources of nutritional data, dietary assessment tools and related definitions are presented. The specific issues which need to be considered and tackled when carrying out a dietary survey are also presented, together with the current databases on the food habits of the Greek population. Many of the issues considered rely on the adaptation in the Greek context of the European Union supported project: “European Food Consumption Survey Method - EFCOSUM”. In parallel to information about dietary choices, the study of nutrition-related disorders requires data concerning hereditary, somatometric and socio-economic characteristics, as well as the physical activity levels of the study participants. Hence, this review concludes by presenting and discussing the recording methods and classification schemes, comparable between countries, for these individual characteristics.

Key words: Diet, Dietary survey.