Use of Diet-tracking Websites as a Resource for Hard-to-Find Food Label Information: An Example Using Specialty Grocery Store Items

Many specialty foods cannot be found in research-focused food databases. However, some nutrient data can be found for many of these foods through individual website searches using brand and store names. Some popular diet-tracking websites contain data for over 3 million foods, data often entered by consumers, based on non-systematic searches. The reliability of these data to guide dietary data entry decisions are unknown. Five popular diet tracking websites were used to compare availability and accuracy of data for food items from a specialty grocery store that are currently unavailable in research-focused food databases.