Nutrition and health-related risk factors could be identified through the implementation of the nutrition preventive strategies, such as nutrition screening, for the Chinese elderly population who are at high risk of malnutrition. Efficacious culturally sensitive nutrition assessment tools and nutrition screening tools hold the most essential value to assess the nutritional health status among the Chinese elderly. A standardized nutrition screening tool, the DETERMINE Checklist, has been used to determine the nutritional health risk status among the elderly but not the Chinese elderly. Focus group research developed cultural appropriate dietary assessment tools, the food inventory list and Chinese food photos, to evaluate the adequacy of food consumption. A case study used the Nutrition and Health Related Questionnaire to evaluate the efficacy of the standardized DETERMINE Checklist. The Nutrition and Health Related Questionnaire included a dietary assessment method, the 24-hour dietary recall, and the modified DETERMINE Checklist was developed from the integrated questions of the standardized DETERMINE Checklist and Level I Screen. The efficacy of the standardized checklist, the sensitivity and specificity, among fifty-eight Chinese elderly age 70 or older, was evaluated through the comparison of the adequacy of food consumption and the identification of the nutritional health risk status. Results showed that the majority (95%) of the Chinese elderly participants had inadequate food consumption as measured by the U.S. Food Guide Pyramid. The standardized DETERMINE Checklist was not sensitive (40%-60%) or specific (63.6%-46.1%) in evaluating the nutritional health risk status among this population. The conclusion from this study was the modified DETERMINE Checklist designed for this study included questions with a single perspective in assessing the inadequacy of food consumption and the physical inability, to identify the level of severity on the nutritional health risk status better than the standardized DETERMINE Checklist. The research prototype model provided a base assessment process of the nutritional health risk status for the minority Chinese elderly. Complex interactions between acculturation, language competency, accessibility of cultural food, and socioeconomic factors related to the nutritional health risk status are needed for further qualitative research investigations. / Graduation date: 2000

Graduation date: 1999