RESUMEN
BACKGROUND: In patients with breast cancer, a healthy diet can help reduce breast cancer-specific recurrence, mortality, and comorbid chronic disease rates. There have been few studies on dietary habits immediately after breast cancer diagnosis, especially those involving the Asian population. Therefore, this study aimed to compare the nutritional habits of newly diagnosed patients with breast cancer and the general population without cancer in Korea using propensity score (PS) matching. METHODS: We conducted a case-controlled study of 157 patients with breast cancer and 2,363 cancer-free control participants from the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. The PS values for the predicted probability of patients with breast cancer and the general population were estimated using logistic regression analysis, including age and body mass index. The dietary patterns were assessed using a 24-hour recall of 1 day and the Food Frequency Questionnaire. RESULTS: PS matching showed that patients with breast cancer consumed fewer calories and carbohydrates; however, they consumed more protein and fat compared to the general population. Compared to the general population, patients with breast cancer consumed more healthy foods such as fish, seaweed, vegetables, fruit, mixed-grain rice, and nuts; however, they also consumed more soup, stew, and red meat. CONCLUSION: Newly diagnosed patients with breast cancer have some healthy dietary habits compared to the general population. However, there is considerable room for improvement in their diet quality. Our results support the need to develop tailored dietary recommendations for patients with breast cancer during the diagnostic and posttreatment periods to improve their diet quality.
RESUMEN
The Mediterranean diet (MD) has beneficial effects on cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and mortality. Although various attempts have been made for estimating adherence to the MD using diet quality indices, few studies involving validated questionnaires for estimating adherence have been performed in Asian populations. We aimed to develop and validate the Korean version of the Mediterranean Diet Adherence Screener (K-MEDAS) by including 211 participants that visited health check-up centers and 116 participants with overweight or hypercholesterolemia that visited obesity clinic. The participants completed both the K-MEDAS and a 106-item food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). We translated 13 questions and developed 1 question. Considering the agreement between the K-MEDAS and FFQ, nine of the 14 questions showed moderate or high kappa values (≥0.4). The total MD scores measured by the K-MEDAS and FFQ showed substantial concordance (intraclass correlation coefficient = 0.678, 95% confidence interval: 0.520, 0.785). Multiple linear regression analyses revealed significant inverse associations between MD score and the levels of serum total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and non-high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, after adjusting for confounding variables. We found that K-MEDAS is valid tool for assessing adherence to the MD in the Korean population.