Food eating patterns and health: a reexamination of the Ten-State and HANES I surveys.

Dietary, clinical, and biochemical data from the Ten-State Nutrition Survey (1968 to 1970) and the Health and Nutrition Examination Survey I (1971 to 1974), have been reexamined by factor analysis to focus attention on eating patterns as a means of relating food intake to health. The seven statistically different eating patterns generated were characterized by disproportionate consumption of different food groups. The relationship between the combination of foods that people ate and the state of their nutritional health was examined for both samples in total, and for various age, sex, race, region, and income groups within the Health and Nutrition Examination Survey I sample.