ArticleAdvances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.)2016
Perspective: Randomized Controlled Trials Are Not a Panacea for Diet-Related Research.
Article in Advances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.), 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 63 papers, 7 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
63 citing papers in PubMed, 7 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Systematic review and meta-analysis of lifestyle modification interventions and their impact on seizure reduction and quality of life.Epilepsia · 2026Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Tree Nut and Peanut Consumption and Risk of Cardiovascular Disease: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.Advances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.) · 2023Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Fragility of cardiovascular outcome trials (CVOTs) examining nutrition interventions among patients with diabetes mellitus: a systematic review of randomized controlled trials.Hormones (Athens, Greece) · 2022Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Assessments of risk of bias in systematic reviews of observational nutritional epidemiologic studies are often not appropriate or comprehensive: a methodological study.BMJ nutrition, prevention & health · 2021Pooled it
- Association of dietary patterns derived by reduced-rank regression with colorectal cancer risk and mortality.European journal of nutrition · 2024Trial
- Lessons learned from two clinical trials on nutritional supplements to reduce aggressive behaviour.Journal of evaluation in clinical practice · 2022Trial
- The Effects of Increasing Fruit and Vegetable Intake in Children with Asthma on the Modulation of Innate Immune Responses.Nutrients · 2022Trial
- Trial
- The impact of a randomized dietary and physical activity intervention on chronic inflammation among obese African-American women.Women & health · 2020Trial
- The impact of financial incentives on participants' food purchasing patterns in a supermarket-based randomized controlled trial.The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity · 2017Trial
- Diet quality and depressive symptoms in older adults, assessing the effect modification by genetic predisposition and low-grade inflammation: a target trial emulation.Molecular psychiatry · 2026Article
- A call for methodological rigour: suspending systematic reviews and meta-analyses of observational studies on ultra-processed foods.European journal of clinical nutrition · 2026Review
- The (ab)use of food frequency questionnaire data in substitution modelling in nutritional epidemiology: a critique.European journal of clinical nutrition · 2026Review
- Review
- Perspective: Food Environment, Climate Change, Inflammation, Diet, and Health.Advances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.) · 2025Review
- Fueling Soccer Players: A Scoping Review and Audit of Literature Related to Soccer-Specific Guidelines for Carbohydrate Intake.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2025Article
- Prevention of chronic disease using vitamins-a case study of the vitamin D and cardiovascular disease hypothesis using evidence from randomised controlled and prospective cohort studies.European journal of nutrition · 2025Article
3 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Research into the role of diet in health faces a number of methodologic challenges in the choice of study design, measurement methods, and analytic options. Heavier reliance on randomized controlled trial (RCT) designs is suggested as a way to solve these challenges. We present and discuss 7 inherent and practical considerations with special relevance to RCTs designed to study diet: 1) the need for narrow focus; 2) the choice of subjects and exposures; 3) blinding of the intervention; 4) perceived asymmetry of treatment in relation to need; 5) temporal relations between dietary exposures and putative outcomes; 6) strict adherence to the intervention protocol, despite potential clinical counter-indications; and 7) the need to maintain methodologic rigor, including measuring diet carefully and frequently. Alternatives, including observational studies and adaptive intervention designs, are presented and discussed. Given high noise-to-signal ratios interjected by using inaccurate assessment methods in studies with weak or inappropriate study designs (including RCTs), it is conceivable and indeed likely that effects of diet are underestimated. No matter which designs are used, studies will require continued improvement in the assessment of dietary intake. As technology continues to improve, there is potential for enhanced accuracy and reduced user burden of dietary assessments that are applicable to a wide variety of study designs, including RCTs.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.