Background: It has been hypothesized that monosodium glutamate (MSG), a flavor enhancer, is positively associated with weight gain, which influences

Objective: While corner store-based nutrition interventions have emerged as a potential strategy to increase healthy food availability in low-income communities, few evaluation studies exist. We present the results of a trial in Baltimore City to increase the availability and sales of healthier food options in local stores.Design: Quasi-experimental study.Setting: Corner stores owned by Korean-Americans and supermarkets located in East and West Baltimore.Subjects: Seven corner stores and two supermarkets in East Baltimore received a 10-month intervention and six corner stores and two supermarkets in West Baltimore served as comparison.Results: During and post-intervention, stocking of healthy foods and weekly reported sales of some promoted foods increased significantly in intervention stores compared with comparison stores. Also, intervention storeowners showed significantly higher self-efficacy for stocking some healthy foods in comparison to West Baltimore storeowners.Conclusions: Findings of the study demonstrated that increases in the stocking and promotion of healthy foods can result in increased sales. Working in small corner stores may be a feasible means of improving the availability of healthy foods and their sales in a low-income urban community.

Dietary patterns have been used to identify typical combinations of foods that may be associated with disease risks. We defined dietary patterns among 195,298 participants of the Multiethnic Cohort Study in Hawaii and Los Angeles in 1993–1996. Intakes of Food Guide Pyramid groups were calculated from a quantitative FFQ for subjects of 5 ethnic groups (African Americans, Hawaiians, Japanese Americans, Latinos, and whites). Three distinct dietary patterns, “Fat and Meat,” “Vegetables,” and “Fruit and Milk,” were identified by exploratory factor analysis with a varimax rotation and validated by confirmatory factor analysis. Similar factor loadings were found for each of 10 ethnic-gender groups in stratified analyses. The odds ratios (OR) for being above the median scores for each factor were calculated. Age, gender, and ethnicity had relatively strong associations with dietary patterns whereas education showed only weak associations. BMI ≥ 30 was strongly positively associated with the Fat and Meat pattern (OR = 2.14, 95% CI: 2.08–2.20, vs. BMI < 25). Current smokers showed a positive association with the Fat and Meat pattern (OR = 1.67, CI: 1.62–1.72, vs. nonsmokers) and inverse associations with the Vegetables (OR = 0.66, CI: 0.64–0.68) and Fruit and Milk patterns (OR = 0.53, CI: 0.52–0.55). Physical activity was positively associated with the Vegetables and Fruit and Milk patterns but not with the Fat and Meat pattern. These findings support the hypothesis that dietary patterns are influenced by interrelated sociocultural, demographic, and other lifestyle factors and may be useful in investigations of diet-disease relations.

Obesity and other diet-related chronic diseases are more prevalent in low-income urban areas, which commonly have limited access to healthy foods. The authors implemented an intervention trial in nine food stores, including two supermarkets and seven corner stores, in a low-income, predominantly African American area of Baltimore City, with a comparison group of eight stores in another low-income area of the city. The intervention (Baltimore Healthy Stores; BHS) included an environmental component to increase stocks of more nutritious foods and provided point-of-purchase promotions including signage for healthy choices and interactive nutrition education sessions. Using pre- and postassessments, the authors evaluated the impact of the program on 84 respondents sampled from the intervention and comparison areas. Exposure to intervention materials was modest in the intervention area, and overall healthy food purchasing scores, food knowledge, and self-efficacy did not show significant improvements associated with intervention status. However, based on adjusted multivariate regression results, the BHS program had a positive impact on healthfulness of food preparation methods and showed a trend toward improved intentions to make healthy food choices. Respondents in the intervention areas were significantly more likely to report purchasing promoted foods because of the presence of a BHS shelf label. This is the first food store intervention trial in low-income urban communities to show positive impacts at the consumer level.

Use of multivitamin-multimineral supplements is widespread and can contribute substantially to total nutrient intakes. In the Hawaii-Los Angeles Multiethnic Cohort (MEC), 48% of men and 56% of women without chronic diseases reported use of multivitamin supplements at least weekly over the past year. We calculated the prevalence of nutrient adequacy for 17 nutrients based on responses to a self-administered quantitative food-frequency questionnaire administered to MEC participants at baseline in 1993-1996. Although the prevalence of nutrient adequacy from food only was higher for multivitamin supplement users (n = 21,056) than for nonusers (n = 69,715), differences averaged only 2 percentage points. For multivitamin users, the prevalence of adequacy improved by an average of 8 percentage points for both men and women when intake from supplements was included. Users were also more likely to have potentially excessive intakes, particularly for iron, zinc, vitamin A, and niacin. The 26,735 MEC participants in Hawaii who answered an open-ended question about multivitamin use in 1999-2001 reported using 1246 different products. The nutrient profile of these products varied widely, and the composition of products at the 90th percentile was 10-fold greater than the composition at the median for some nutrients. We conclude that analyses of nutrient adequacy and excess for supplement users should be extended to national samples and that composition data on actual supplements used are preferable to assuming a default nutrient profile for multivitamin supplements. Multivitamin products could be better formulated to reduce the prevalence of inadequacy and also to reduce the risk of excessive intakes.