Physicians underestimate calcium intake in women.

Background And Objectives: Personalized nutritional counseling about calcium intake during office encounters requires rapid estimation of calcium intake. We compared the accuracy of physician estimates to a validated calcium intake measure and characterized women whose intakes were incorrectly deemed inadequate by physicians.

Methods: As part of a controlled trial of brief, office-based calcium intake counseling of women, family physicians estimated calcium intake from patients' self-reported intake of dairy food/beverage intake and from their supplement use.

Barriers to supplemental calcium use among women in suburban family practice: a report from the Cleveland Clinic Ambulatory Research Network (CleAR-eN).

Background: The majority of adult women in the United States fail to meet daily calcium intake recommendations. This study was undertaken to (1) identify predictors of calcium supplement use versus non-use, (2) understand barriers to calcium supplementation, and (3) determine the potential impact of physician recommendation on calcium supplement use.

Methods: Surveys were self-administered by 185 women, ages 20 to 64, presenting consecutively for care at 6 suburban community-based family medicine practices within the Cleveland Clinic Ambulatory Research Network (CleAR-eN).