Adherence to the Mediterranean diet of megalopolis residents based on the analysis of consumer activity
Authors:   Federal Research Centre of Nutrition, Biotechnology and Food Safety, Moscow, Russian Federation, Pilipenko V.I. , Isakov V.A. ,   Federal Research Centre of Nutrition, Biotechnology and Food Safety, Moscow, Russian Federation, Artemov A.V. ,   Technical University of Munich, Munich, Germany, Sharaev M.G. ,   Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (Skoltech), Moscow, Russian Federation,   BIMAI-Lab, Biomedically Informed Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates
Published: September 2024

Currently, the most significant pool of evidence for health benefits in the scientific literature is formed from the use of the Mediterranean Diet Pattern (MDP). The purpose of the study was to assess adherence to the MDP in the megalopolis (Moscow) based on an analysis of consumer activity in a large retail chain. Material and methods. From anonymized purchase data for 2016–2018, 19570 holders of loyality cards of the retail chain were selected according to the following selection criteria: the presence of a dense of a dense segment of purchases (more than 6 months, where there is at least 1 purchase in 2 weeks), where the total cost of purchases was at least 4,700 rubles / week and at least 4 different products were purchased, they have available data on gender and age. The classification of a set of purchased products and dishes by food groups was carried out, and complex dishes were transformed into a set of their ingredients based on their formulation, and their distribution was carried out according to the corresponding food groups with the summation of the their mass. The weight of the constituent food groups was divided by the number of days of the active shopping period with the addition of 7 days for the consumption of the goods from the last purchase. The obtained values of the acquisition of food groups, expressed as grams per day, were compared with the criteria of the MDP for each of the food groups taken into account. Upon reaching the threshold value of each of the criteria, the patient received 1 commitment point. For each customer was calculated the cumulative number of achieved food categories criteria. Results. Of the 19570 participants in the study, only 542 people (2.76%) overcame the limit of low adherence to the MDP (7 points). Among the studied criteria of the MDP, the lowest compliance was obtained in relation to cereals, legumes and olive oil (less than 10% of buyers). Despite the revealed significant differences in most criteria of the MDP, the distribution pattern between men and women has much in common – the difference does not reach 5%. The average values of the sum of the fulfilled criteria of the MDP by age groups were significantly lower only for the age under 45 years (4.03 ± 1.24 versus 4.19 ± 1.33 for the 45–60 years group and 4.23 ± 1.36 for people over 60 years old, p = 0.001). An increase in adherence with age was noted for most of the MDP criteria. Conclusion. Thus, it can be concluded that adherence to the MDP was established only in a small part of the study participants. Young people are less committed to the criteria of MDP in their diets, which in the long term is dangerous for them due to the likelihood of an early onset of chronic diseases. Key words: criteria of the Mediterranean diet, nutrition assessment, purchasing activity, age-sex differences