Determination of nutritional needs
Costa, G.
Cancer Research 37(7 Pt 2): 2419-2424
1977
ISSN/ISBN: 0008-5472 PMID: 324618 Document Number: 121195
As optimum nutrition is indispensable for optimum health, it underlines studies aimed at defining optimum nutrition in terms of amounts of nutrients to be eaten per unit time. In spite of many approaches, significant uncertainties remain. Historically, the first nutritional standards were derived from epidemiological studies. The limitations of the epidemiological approach (which has nonetheless produced a wealth of fundamental knowledge) are its lack of applicability to the individual subject and the uncertainties inherent in estimating food consumption in free-living populations. Derivation of nutritional needs from measurement of obligatory losses had been undermined by the many criticisms, both theoretical and practical, levelled at balance techniques, and by ignorance of the mechanism which regulates the efficient use of biological fuel.Recently, combinations of anthropometric criteria and biochemical measurements have been used successfully to gauge the effects of hyperalimentation in malnourished patients, but such methods do not resolve the theoretical uncertainties. An unresolved philosophical point is the degree of precision required in estimating nutritional needs. It seems that adequate criteria exist for the practical purposes of refeeding a depleted patient, but for the more abstract task of understanding the theoretical basis of nutrition, current methods and criteria are inadequate.