Development of “Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH)-Heart and Stroke (HAS) Calculator” for personalized feedback

Co-lead:

  • Jiak Chin Koh  
    Providence Health Care

Team members: 

  • Douglas Manuel
    Clinical Epidemiology Program, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
  • Health Analysis Division of Statistics Canada
  • University of Ottawa Departments of Family Medicine, and Public Health
  • Kimberly McGrail
    Centre for Health Services and Policy Research
  • Health Data Research Network Canada (and SPOR Canadian Data Platform)
  • Population Data BC
  • UBC Health
  • UBC School of Population and Public Health
  • Deirdre Hennessy
    Health Analysis Division of Statistics Canada
  • Natalie Walshaw
    Cardiac Clinic, Royal Columbian Hospital, FH
  • Courtenay Hopson
    University Hospital of Northern BC, Northern Health
  • Jennifer Brown
    The Ottawa Hospital Bariatric Centre of Excellence
  • Alison Quinlan
    BC Ministry of Health
  • Food, Nutrition and Health Program, UBC
  • Carol Anderson
    Interested Public / Community User
  • Adelia Jacobs
    Human Nutrition and Dietetics, Food, Nutrition and Health Program, UBC
  • Julia Chen
    Dietetics, UBC

A healthy lifestyle is the cornerstone of disease prevention and improvement of health. While most Canadians know that healthy eating can reduce the risk of chronic disease, they may not appreciate their own dietary pattern, and specifically may not know its associated health risks, or ways of improving it. The Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) dietary pattern is effective for reducing high blood pressure (hypertension) and heart disease (cardiovascular disease) risk, yet adherence to this dietary pattern in Canada is low. With this grant support, our team of healthcare professionals and researchers will develop and distribute a web-based, mobile-friendly DASH-Dietary Pattern Calculator that addresses this gap by providing a personalized estimate of the DASH dietary pattern and cardiovascular disease risk. The tool, which we call the DASH-Heart and Stroke (DASH-HAS) calculator will also provide individualized suggestions on how to improve dietary patterns to be in line with established DASH dietary recommendations.