Citation
Rummo, Pasquale E.; Albrecht, Sandra S.; & Gordon-Larsen, Penny (2015). Field Validation of Food Outlet Databases: The Latino Food Environment in North Carolina, USA. Public Health Nutrition, 18(6), 977-982. PMCID: PMC4269578Abstract
OBJECTIVE: Obtaining valid, reliable measures of food environments that serve Latino communities is important for understanding barriers to healthy eating in this at-risk population.DESIGN: The primary aim of the study was to examine agreement between retail food outlet data from two commercial databases, Nielsen TDLinx (TDLinx) for food stores and Dun & Bradstreet (D&B) for food stores and restaurants, relative to field observations of food stores and restaurants in thirty-one census tracts in Durham County, NC, USA. We also examined differences by proportion of Hispanic population (SETTING: One hundred and seventy-four food stores and 337 restaurants in Durham County, NC, USA.
RESULTS: We found that overall sensitivity of food store listings in TDLinx was higher (64 %) than listings in D&B (55 %). Twenty-five food stores were characterized by auditors as Latino food stores, with 20 % identified in TDLinx, 52 % in D&B and 56 % in both sources. Overall sensitivity of restaurants (68 %) was higher than sensitivity of Latino restaurants (38 %) listed in D&B. Sensitivity did not differ substantially by Hispanic composition of neighbourhoods.
CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that while TDLinx and D&B commercial data sources perform well for total food stores, they perform less well in identifying small and independent food outlets, including many Latino food stores and restaurants.
URL
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1368980014001281Reference Type
Journal ArticleYear Published
2015Journal Title
Public Health NutritionSeries Title
PE Rummo et al. Public Health Nutr 18 (6), 1141. Apr 2015. PMID 25046473.Author(s)
Rummo, Pasquale E.Albrecht, Sandra S.
Gordon-Larsen, Penny
PMCID
PMC4269578ORCiD
Gordon-Larsen - 0000-0001-5322-4188Rummo - 0000-0002-9285-5430