NR 228 Week 3 Eight Nutrient Report Example

Nutrient Report: Eight Nutrients From Three Days of Eating, Each Set Against the Reference for a Woman of 22, in Percent and in Cups

Student Name

College of Nursing, Chamberlain University

NR 228: Nutrition, Health & Wellness

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

Nutrient Report: Eight Nutrients From Three Days of Eating, Each Set Against the Reference for a Woman of 22, in Percent and in Cups

The Standard, Named Before It Is Used

This report uses the three-day food record from last week, analyzed by the course's diet analysis tool, and compares the average intake with the Dietary Reference Intakes for a woman aged 19 to 30. For most nutrients, the comparison is to the Recommended Dietary Allowance, the amount that meets the needs of nearly all healthy people in that group, or, where no allowance exists, to the Adequate Intake. For sodium, it is the Chronic Disease Risk Reduction Intake, the level above which reducing intake is expected to lower chronic disease risk (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine [NASEM], 2019). Calcium and vitamin D references come from the Institute of Medicine's 2011 report (Institute of Medicine, 2011), and fiber from its 2005 macronutrient report (Institute of Medicine, 2005).

Naming the standard matters because each one means something different. Falling below a Recommended Dietary Allowance does not mean a person is deficient; it means the risk of inadequacy is higher. Exceeding a risk-reduction intake for sodium is not a diagnosis either; it is a signal about long-term risk.

The Table: Percent and Quantity Together

Table 1 gives each nutrient with the three-day average, the reference, and the difference expressed two ways.

Table 1

Average Nutrient Intake Against the Dietary Reference Intakes

Note. Food equivalents are approximate, based on typical label values; the tool's estimates depend on the matches chosen for restaurant items.

Choosing Which Rows Matter

Three rows matter most, and they are chosen because they are large, reliable and connected. Fiber at 52% is the largest shortfall that food can easily correct. Sodium at 161% is the largest excess, and it comes from the same meals that crowd out fiber, the restaurant food on work days. Calcium at 62% is the third, because a gap of about a cup of milk or yogurt a day is both meaningful and easy to close, and at 22, calcium intake still contributes to building bone.

These three share a single solution. The pre-shift meal planned last week, frozen vegetables with rice or pasta and beans or an egg, would add fiber and potassium and would displace some of the restaurant food that drives the sodium. Adding a cup of yogurt to that meal would close most of the calcium gap. One change addresses three rows.

Protein and energy are the rows that need no attention, and they are worth a sentence because they explain something. My energy intake is about what I need, and my protein is well above the reference. So the problem is not that I eat too little or too much overall, and adding food is not the answer. The problem is the mix: the calories that would carry fiber, calcium and potassium are being spent on fried food and refined grains. That is why the change has to replace food rather than add it. Adding a yogurt and a bowl of vegetables without cutting the fries would raise my energy intake above my needs, which over months would show up as weight.

Rows Noticed and Left

Two rows look alarming and are deliberately left for now. Vitamin D at 20% looks like the worst number in the table, but very few foods contain much vitamin D, the record cannot capture sunlight exposure, and intake from food alone below the reference is common in healthy people. Whether I am actually short of vitamin D could only be answered with a blood test, which is a question for my primary care provider rather than a conclusion from a food record.

Iron at 78% is the second. As a menstruating woman, I need more iron than men my age, and a shortfall over time could matter. But three days of eating cannot show whether my body's iron stores are low. If I were tired or pale, a blood count and ferritin would tell me; the food record cannot. I have noted it, and a cup of fortified cereal at breakfast, which I already eat some days, would cover the gap if I ate it more often.

A Gap Is Not a Diagnosis

Every number in the table describes intake, not status. A person can eat 62% of the calcium reference for three days and have healthy bones; another can meet the reference and still be at risk for other reasons. The report therefore makes no claim that I am deficient in anything. What it shows is where my eating pattern falls short of the amounts that would make inadequacy unlikely, and where it exceeds the amount linked with long-term risk. Those are reasons to change what I eat, not reasons to take supplements or to worry about a condition I do not know I have.

The report's own limits are the same as last week's: three days, two of them work days, self-recorded and analyzed by a tool that guessed at restaurant recipes. A second record in October will show whether the pre-shift meal moved the three rows that matter.

If the October record shows fiber above 20 grams and sodium closer to 2,500 mg on work days, I will count that as progress, even if neither number reaches its reference exactly.

Progress, in this report, means direction.

References

Institute of Medicine. (2005). Dietary reference intakes for energy, carbohydrate, fiber, fat, fatty acids, cholesterol, protein, and amino acids. The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/10490

Institute of Medicine. (2011). Dietary reference intakes for calcium and vitamin D. The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/13050

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2019). Dietary reference intakes for sodium and potassium. The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25353