Introducing the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines The 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans includes three main chapters highlighting the themes of this edition:
- Chapter 1: Key Elements of Healthy Eating Patterns
- Chapter 2: Shifts Needed to Align with Healthy Eating Patterns
- Chapter 3: Everyone Has a Role in Supporting Healthy Eating Patterns
The chapters are built around five Guidelines. It also includes 13 Key Recommendations with more details on what makes up healthy eating patterns. Additional information is provided throughout the text and appendices of the Dietary Guidelines. View the Dietary Guidelines for Americans Eighth Edition 2015-2020.
Begin Transcript
Laura Osterman: Welcome to this edition of the Vanderbilt University Health and Wellness Wellcast. I am Laura Osterman with Health Plus. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans are issued and updated every 5 years by the United States Government. The Eighth Edition was recently released, and today, we are here with Jamie Pope, Assistant Professor of Nutrition Sciences at the Vanderbilt School of Nursing. Thanks for joining us.
Jamie Pope: I am happy to be here. Thank you, Laura.
Laura Osterman: Can you give us some background about the guidelines?
Jamie Pope: The guidelines have been put out by the US government jointly between the Department of Health and Human Services and USDA since 1980, and as you noted, they come out every 5 years. The guidelines are used as the foundation for policies, school lunch programs, federal programs, and federal policy making. They are also intended to help guide health professionals in terms of dietary advice that should be given to the general public. They are evidence based, based on what we know to date in terms of what is the healthiest approach and how our diet affects not only our overall health but our risk of disease. So, that is one reason that they revised frequently is because we are always learning, and the next edition will probably have some changes from this one,
Laura Osterman: Now, the guidelines this year introduce three key themes. Can you tell us about the first theme introduced in Chapter 1, the key elements of healthy eating?
Jamie Pope: A healthy eating pattern is hard to describe in just a few minutes because there are so many different aspects, and it is important to realize that healthy eating can look many different ways and that different people can eat different ways and still be eating a healthy eating pattern, but bottom line, an emphasis of nutrient dense foods, for the most part choosing foods that for the number of calories they provide that they provide a lot of vitamins, minerals, fiber, and other nutrients that come along versus foods that are more energy dense and less nutrient dense. These are foods that give you lots of calories but not necessarily many nutrients like sugar sweetened beverages, many desserts, fried foods increase energy density, so trying to emphasize more nutrient density, controlling portion sizes to keep calories and balancing intake with expenditure.
Laura Osterman: The second theme introduced is the shifts needed to align with healthy eating patterns. What kind of shifts are we talking about here?
Jamie Pope: Oh, there are many shifts. It is interesting when you look at some of the graphic representations that are included within the new guidelines that what we are supposed to be eating more of, like fiber, calcium, certain nutrients, we are eating below. What we are supposed to be eating less of like saturated fat, sodium, sugar, we eat above recommended. So, we kind of are in the opposite end of the continuum, not only on specific nutrients but on food groups as well. We do not eat the number of whole grains versus refined wheat, too many refined grains. So, there is a discrepancy between actual intake and what is recommended, but the new guidelines take into account these food groups, they take into account these various nutrients, but then within that, they are still encouraging to look at your diet not by just these individual components but as an overall healthy eating pattern. Some of the main differences in these guidelines from the guidelines before is for the first time the guidelines put out of a ceiling for sugar. In the past, they have said eat less, moderate. This time, they actually said consume less than 10% of your calories from sugar. Current intake in the US is around 13% calories from sugar, and what studies have found is when you eat more that 10% of your calories from sugar you have a hard time meeting you nutrient needs and staying within your calorie level. Other changes was that they took cholesterol out as a nutrient of concern, but that does not mean we should not be aware of cholesterol. It just means when you look at surveys Americans were eating about 270 mg a day on average and the ceiling was 300. So, it was not a nutrient of concern because we are not necessarily overeating on it, but that does not give us license to go crazy. Cholesterol is only found in animal foods, not in plant foods at all. So, you still want to emphasize a plant-based diet. There were some changes in the sodium guidelines. In fact, they kind of lightened up so to speak on the sodium guidelines. It is still the 2300 mg recommendation that we should not exceed that amount. We eat around 3400 mg in this country, so the 2300 is still quite am ambitious goal, but in the last guidelines, they had recommended actually that more than half adults restrict their sodium intake to 1500 mg. In this guideline, they lightened up on that, and they said all adults should aim for the 2300 mg. Only those who have high blood pressure or at risk for high pressure should restrict potentially further to get better blood pressure lowering.
Laura Osterman: Now, another theme that the guidelines address is how each of us can play a role in supporting healthy eating patterns in our communities. What can Vanderbilt faculty and staff do to promote healthy eating patterns here at work?
Jamie Pope: Well, I think number one is model healthy eating patterns. I think that if we live it then we influence others too, and I think Vanderbilt as a whole does a great job of not only offering options on however you want to eat you can eat here at Vanderbilt but also educating us in terms of maybe potentially healthier choices, providing nutrition information so that people can be aware when they make their choices here at work, and I think the emphasis on being active, our campus is a wonderful one to get out and get around. Even in cold weather, you can walk through the tunnels that there is just so many opportunities here not only to eat well but to move as well, and I think individually just not trying to be perfect in our eating For the most part, I kind of live the 80/20. As long as I am eating healthy and aware 80% of the time, I want to have a little bit elbow room. It is not a whole lot of fun and kind of boring if you had to feel like you had to eat “perfectly all the times.” So, I had a colleague make an interesting comment about healthy eating being the default, and I think that is a great goal, not only for us but for how we raise our kids. It is that our norm is healthy eating instead of the other way around.
Laura Osterman: Thanks for listening. Please feel free to leave us any comments on this Wellcast on the form at the bottom of this page. If you have a story suggestion, please email it to us at health.wellness@vanderbilt.edu or you can use the “Contact Us” page on our website at healthandwellness.vanderbilt.edu. -- end of recording --
