Good Luck If You're Searching for Good-for-You Eats
Sep. 26, 2006 — -- Most packaged foods in the United States are required to post nutrition facts and figures on their labels -- but Americans cannot understand what those facts and figures mean, according to new research published in today's issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
The study finds that many people can't understand the nutrition labels on food packages.
Researchers gave a nutrition-label survey to 200 patients in their family doctors' office.
The survey had been drawn up with input from doctors and dietitians -- and was designed to measure whether patients could understand those labels.
Even though the patients surveyed were reasonably well-educated, most of them couldn't understand much, the researchers found.
Of those surveyed, 77 percent had at least ninth-grade reading abilities and more than two-thirds had at least some college.
Overall, patients answered close to 70 percent of the survey questions correctly.
But only 22 patients could calculate the number of carbohydrates in two slices of low-carbohydrate bread.
And only 60 percent of patients could figure out how many carbohydrates were in half a bagel when the serving size on the package was a whole bagel.
Patients had a hard time with basic math calculations, such as how many calories are in a 20-ounce soda bottle if a single serving size is 8 ounces?
Some experts say that consumers don't always know what to do with the information on a food label.
"When most people look at a food label, their eye goes right to the number of carbohydrates -- the grams of fiber or sugar," said Felicia Stoler, a nutritionist and exercise physiologist in New Jersey.
"But most people don't understand how many carbs are in a single serving, or how many carbs they should eat in a day."
If patients can't rely on nutrition labels to guide their food choices, how can anybody ever know how to eat right?
"Poor understanding of nutrition labels can make it difficult for patients to follow a good diet," said Dr. Russell Rothman, study author and professor at the Vanderbilt Center for Health Services Research in Nashville, Tenn.
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