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22.1: Nutrition Needs Analysis

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    6175
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    Analyzing the needs of the athlete should be done by a qualified professional like the Registered Dietitian. The following section will provide a brief description of the steps the RD will take to determine the athlete's nutrition needs. This process will include determining the athlete's current body composition, weight and diet history, and current food intake. It may also include any current lab work and bone density if these are available.

    Body composition: There are a variety of different ways to measure lean body mass or fat-free mass and fat mass. These techniques include: 1) anthropometrics, 2) underwater weighing, 3) DEXA, 4) Bodpod, 5) bioelectric impedance, 6) isotope dilution and 7) MRI to name a few but not all. Each has strengths and weaknesses. Here is an excellent review of the different methods for measuring body composition. Also, we discussed many of these techniques in a previous chapter.

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2082845/

    Body weight history: The athlete is asked to recall their body weight

    Diet history: The athlete is asked to recall their food intake; this could be over a specific period of time and/or just foods in general. They may also be asked to recall what they ate the previous 24 hours.

    There are a variety of different diet analysis programs available on the internet. Here are several resources for a few of the programs available:

    1. This website provides a general review of a few programs available on the website. It lists Super Tracker which is no longer available (https://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/software).


    22.1: Nutrition Needs Analysis is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

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