National Dietary Survey on Adolescents, Adults, Elderly and Pregnant Women in Montenegro

Abstract

The first national dietary survey in Montenegro “Montenegrin National Dietary Survey on the general population” that was conducted in accordance with the EU Menu methodology was carried out focusing on the target population aged from 10 to 74 years old and an ad-hoc group of pregnant women. In total 1500 respondents were included in this survey in addition to 55 more that participated in the pilot study. A representative sample was created and stratified by age, gender, and region according to the latest census in Montenegro from 2011. According to the stratification and the number of respondents defined by the project, the actual number of respondents in the coastal region is 310, while in the Northern region there are 381 respondents and 609 respondents in the Central Region. The survey is related to the 1300 subjects on the general population divided into the three age groups of adolescents, adults, and an elderly and ad-hoc group of 200 pregnant women. Dietary survey tools, questionnaires elaborated based on the recommendations of the guidance of the European Food Safety Authority were used together with the developed and harmonised dietary software to fit the research needs. Subjects were evenly distributed over all four seasons including weekly working days (~ 70%) and weekends (~ 30%). The response rate for the general population was 80,7% and for the ad-hoc group of pregnant women 87,7%. All data were collected by using the 24-hour dietary recall method, on two non-consecutive days for each participant and were entered into the Diet assess and Plan platform for further processing and evaluation. Suitable control and quality assurance mechanisms were also applied.