Objective: To establish diet balance index (DBI) for Chinese elderly population that a measure of dietary quality was developed to comprehensively assess the eating pattern for them, and examine the validity of the DBI.
Methods: Aimed at key points of nutrition requirement for the older adults, the approached DBI for the Chinese elderly persons was adapted from selection food components and scoring schemes of 2005 Chinese DBI, and it was applied to measure the three-day diet quality of 177 participants over the age of 60 living in rest-homes for the elderly.
Results: The DBI scoring and evaluating system could embody the actual intake of most food groups and nutrients, and synthetically reflect the direction and degrees of deficient intake, excessive intake and inbalanced status of nutrient intake. On the whole, intakes of diets of sample subjects were inadequate. Gender, age and fare expenses could affect the diet quality, and the leading impact factors of food groups on diet quality occurred for dairy products, legumes, vegetables, fruits, edible oil and meats.
Conclusion: The DBI for the Chinese elderly persons could summarily be measured the diet quality of the study persons. The major problems of the dietary pattern presented herein should be found.