Potential of Existing Online 24-h Dietary Recall Tools for National Dietary Surveys

Objective: To describe existing online, 24-h dietary recall (24-h DR) tools in terms of functionalities and ability to tackle challenges encountered during national dietary surveys, such as maximising response rates and collecting high-quality data from a representative sample of the population, while minimising the cost and response burden.

Design: A search (from 2000 to 2019) was conducted in peer-reviewed and grey literature. For each tool, information on functionalities, validation and user usability studies, and potential adaptability for integration into a new context was collected.

Setting: Not country-specific.

Participants: General population.

Results: Eighteen online 24-h DR tools were identified. Most were developed in Europe, for children ≥10 years old and/or for adults. Eight followed the five multiple-pass steps but used various methodologies and features. Almost all tools (except three) validated their nutrient intake estimates, but with high heterogeneity in methodologies. User usability was not always assessed, and rarely by applying real-time methods. For researchers, eight tools developed a web platform to manage the survey and five appeared to be easily adaptable to a new context.

Conclusions: Among the eighteen online 24-h DR tools identified, the best candidates to be used in national dietary surveys should be those that were validated for their intake estimates, had confirmed user and researcher usability, and seemed sufficiently flexible to be adapted to new contexts. Regardless of the tool, adaptation to another context will still require time and funding, and this is probably the most challenging step.