Abstract

Author(s): Martín Salinas, C.1; Hernández de Diego, E.2

Objective: The objective of this project has been to analyze the degree of correspondence between the eating habits of nursing students and the knowledge of nutrition and dietetics.

Methods: A semicuantitative, on-line and self-completion survey of food frequency consumption was sent to the students by email with a presentation letter, explaining the reasons of the food survey and guaranteeing the anonymity. The analysis of the survey was performed comparing these data with the daily recommended food portions for the Spanish population. For this purpose, the program SPSS 12.0 for Windows (2003) was used.

Results: The weekly intake of food was lower than the recommended servings, except for the snacks and cold meat which are eaten more frequently. In the same manner, the consume of daily intake food was lower than the nutritional recommendations.

Discussion and conclusion: In a context where the Mediterranean diet has been slightly modified to adapt to new lifestyles, eating habits of young students could be considered acceptable. Despite the fact that the study was carried out with a sample consisting of people with nutritional knowledge, diet mistakes were detected like the weekly consume of products of occasional intake. This suggests that the acquisition of nutritional knowledge does not determine the adoption of certain healthy habits, therefore nutritional education and health related education in general should concentrate in different methods that don’t include the intake of information as the only theory