Content of phospholipids in human diets studied by the duplicate-portion technique

1. The phospholipid intake by eight healthy women was studied by the duplicate-portion technique, i.e. chemical analyses of duplicates of the food consumed. Their intake of phospholipids was 1.5-2.5 mmol lipid-phosphorus/d, which corresponds to 0.023-0.059 mmol lipid-P/g dietary fat and 0.24-0.45 mmol lipid-P/MJ respectively. 2. Choline phosphoglyceride constituted 480-700 mmol/mol and ethanolamine phosphoglyceride 170-240 mmol/mol total lipid-P. Most of the choline in nature occurs as choline phospholipids, the intake of which ranged between 0.91-1.85 mmol/d or 0.15-0.33 mmol/MJ. 3. Palmitate, stearate, oleate, and linoleate ere the four major fatty acids both in choline phosphoglyceride and ethanolamine phosphoglyceride. Significant amounts of highly unsaturated, C20 and C22 fatty acids were also observed. It was calculated that 13-33 mg/g total dietary fatty acids was consumed as phospholipids. Together with bile phospholipids, dietary phospholipids and their degradation products may be important in the digestion and absorption processes.