Research

Adherence

Patients with poorer baseline dietary quality (low HEI-C scores) are more likely to make substantive dietary improvements through counseling than those with already good baseline diets.

If you already eat a healthy diet, don't assume counseling is useless. The study shows that people with poorer diets improve the most, but those with good diets can still refine specific areas like sodium or saturated fat. The goal is continuous improvement, not just fixing 'bad' habits.

ModerateQualifiesMEDIUM confidence
Exploratory analysis suggested that poorer diet quality at baseline was associated with greater dietary changes as assessed by HEI-C... those in the lowest tertile of HEI-C at baseline making the most changes in food intake, while those in the upper tertile had no change in overall score.
Paula Brauer et al. · Applied Physiology Nutrition and Metabolism · 2019

Why this rating

Exploratory subgroup analysis, not the primary endpoint.

Source

Nutrient intake and dietary quality changes within a personalized lifestyle intervention program for metabolic syndrome in primary care

Paula Brauer et al. · Applied Physiology Nutrition and Metabolism · 2019

DOI 10.1139/apnm-2019-0070

clinical_trial · n=293Cited 21×
Read the paper
DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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