Household budget survey nutritional data in relation to mortality from coronary heart disease, colorectal cancer and female breast cancer in European countries

Objective: We have undertaken a study to examine whether Household Budget Sun ey (HBS)-derived nutritional patterns are related to mortality from diseases with strong nutritional components, namely coronary heart disease, colorectal cancer and cancer of the female breast. Design: Ecological correlation study. In the contest of the Data Food Networking projects of the European Union, raw data from the national HBS of 10 European countries were provided. For each of the 10 participating countries, daily food availability per capita around 1990 was calculated. Individual foods were aggregated into 12 major food groups that were linked with the diseases under consideration. Mortality data were available from a World Health Organisation database. We have used a composite score to summarise the postulated influence of diet. Setting: Ten European countries circa 1990. Results: The correlation coefficients between the composite score and the age-adjusted mortality fi om each of the studied diseases were. + 0.51 (P similar to 0.14) for colorectal cancer; + 0.72 (P similar to 0.02) for female breast cancer; and + 0.60 (P similar to 0.07) for coronary heart disease, after adjustment for tobacco smoking. Conclusions: We conclude that dietary information from HS is sufficiently reliable to reveal correlations with mortality rates from chronic diseases with fairly strong nutritional roots. HBS data could be used, with little cost, for monitoring secular trends in dietary patterns with a view to their health implications.