Dietary fat intake, fat sources and fatty acid composition in serum among immigrant women from Iran and Turkey compared with women of Swedish ethnicity

Abstract

Background: Immigrants in general seem to be more vulnerable than the host population to developing nutrition-related chronic conditions. This may in part be related to diverging dietary habits, including intake of different types and amounts of dietary fat. Objectives: The main aim of this study was to investigate the dietary fatty acid composition and the dietary fat sources among first generation immigrant women from Iran and Turkey compared with women of Swedish ethnicity. The second aim was to relate the reported dietary fatty acid composition to the fatty acid composition in serum cholesterol esters, and the fatty acid composition in serum to metabolic variables. Design: The study was a cross-sectional health survey of randomly selected foreign-born women (n=107) and native Swedish women (n=50) living in Uppsala. This included 24 h dietary recall repeated four times and administered in the native language. Results and conclusion: A lower proportion of satura ted fatty acids, a higher proportion of linoleic acid and a higher n-6/n-3 ratio were found in the immigrants’ diet than in the diet of the Swedish women. The difference in linoleic acid was also mirrored in serum. Vegetable dishes, together with edible fats, were the major contributors of polyunsaturated fatty acids among the immigrant women. While the fatty acid profile in serum among the immigrant women had both favourable and unfavourable implications, a higher prevalence of obesity and dyslipidaemia was observed in immigrant compared with Swedish-born women. Keywords: dietary fat; fat sources; immigrants; Iranian; metabolic risk factors; serum fatty acid composition; Turkish