Fast-food and full-service restaurant consumption in relation to daily energy and nutrient intakes among US adult cancer survivors, 2003–2012

Healthy diet is an essential component in cancer survivorship care planning. Cancer survivors should be particularly prudent regarding their daily food choices, with an aim of ensuring safe consumption, reducing risk of recurrence or other comorbidity, and improving quality of life. We aimed to examine the impacts of fast-food and full-service restaurant consumption on daily energy and nutrient intakes among US adult cancer survivors. Nationally representative data of 1308 adult cancer survivors came from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2003–2012 waves. First-difference estimator was adopted to address confounding bias from time-invariant unobservables like personal food/beverage preferences by using within-individual variations in diet and restaurant consumption status between two non-consecutive 24-hour dietary recalls. Fast-food and full-service restaurant consumption, respectively, was associated with an increase in daily total energy intake by 125.97 and 152.26 kcal and sodium intake by 312.47 and 373.75 mg. Fast-food consumption was significantly associated with a decrease in daily vitamin A intake by 119.88 µg and vitamin K intake by 30.48 µg, whereas full-service restaurant consumption was associated with an increase in daily fat intake by 8.99 g and omega-6 fatty acid intake by 3.85 g, and a decrease in vitamin D intake by 0.93 µg. Compared with fast-food and full-service restaurant consumption at home, consumption away from home led to further reduced diet quality. Individualized nutrition counseling and food assistance programs should address cancer survivors’ overall dining-out behavior rather than fast-food consumption alone.