The Automated Self-Administered 24-Hour Dietary Recall (ASA24): A Resource for Researchers, Clinicians, and Educators from the National Cancer Institute

Extensive evidence has demonstrated that 24-hour dietary recalls (24HDRs) provide high-quality dietary intake data with minimal bias, making them the preferred tool for monitoring the diets of populations and, increasingly, for studying diet and disease associations (1-3). Traditional 24HDRs, however, are expensive and impractical for large-scale research because they rely on trained interviewers, and multiple administrations are needed to estimate usual intakes. To address these challenges, the National Cancer Institute (NCI), in collaboration with the research firm Westat (Rockville, MD), and with the support of other institutes and offices at the National Institutes of Health, developed the Automated Self-Administered 24-hour dietary recall (ASA24) (4-6). ASA24 is a public-access, freely available, web-based tool for researchers, clinicians and educators, modeled on the Automated Multiple Pass Method (AMPM) (7). Development of an automated self-administered 24HDR for adults began in 2006 and was informed by input from stakeholders participating in an External Working Group and small-scale cognitive and usability testing (4,5). A Beta version released in August 2009 has been used by over 175 researchers to collect over 40,000 recalls; Version 1, which offers improved usability and new features, was released in September 2011 (8). A modified version intended for self-administration by children is under development by researchers at the Baylor College of Medicine (Houston, TX) and is expected to be available mid-2012 (9,10). This paper describes the features of ASA24 and planned evaluations.