[How valid are food surveys run by dieticians?]

International recommendations for dialysis treatment include food surveys among the necessary tools for nutritional status evaluation. Several methods are used: 24-hour food recall, 7-day food diary, 3-day food record, food frequency questionnaire, and the most innovative, pictures of the ingested food shot and sent to the dietician with a mobile phone. The information from these surveys is run on software that calculates the amount of ingested nutriments. All these methods have their own advantages and drawbacks. Underestimation of energy intake by the EA is frequent when compared to other techniques. Protein intake from EA can be compared to the proteic catabolic rate (PCR) from urea kinetic modeling. Among EA techniques, the 7-day diary provides the best correlation of protein intake measured with PCR. It is important that the dietician is adequately trained in one of the EA techniques that he or she will be able to apply for the longitudinal follow-up of the patients.