Dietary recall method comparison for hospitalized elderly subjects.

A study was made to compare accuracy of the 24-hour recall, including both number of items recalled and amounts of food eaten, for elderly subjects using three methods: I, unaided oral recall, II, printed questionnaire, and III, interview with actual-size color pictures of foods. Sixty hospitalized patients, age 65 to 94, were interviewed. Factors studied for influence on scores were age, sex, educational level, obesity, place of residence, and food preparer. Results showed no significant difference in scores owing to method used, except that 30 subjects above the median age of 76 scored higher on number of items recalled and amounts of food eaten when using the printed questionnaire. None of the demographic factors studied made a significant difference in scores.