NUTRIENT INTAKE AND PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT IN EUMENORRHEIC AND AMENORRHEIC FEMALE ATHLETES - A PRELIMINARY-STUDY

The present study showed that amenorrheic athletes (AAs) scored higher on the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT) (p <.05) than eumenorrheic athlete s (EAs), indicating more aberrant eating patterns in the first group. Scores on the EAT were inversely correlated with fat intake (p<05), si mple carbohydrate intake (p <.01), and percentage saturation of iron ( p<.05) and were positively correlated with total iron binding capacity (p<.01) for the total sample. Physiological assessment of athletes re vealed that there were no significant differences between groups in se rum lipoproteins, with both EAs and AAs having serum lipid profiles in dicative of low cardiovascular risk. Furthermore, low-density lipoprot ein cholesterol was the only lipoprotein significantly and positively correlated with serum estradiol levels for the entire sample (p=.01). The present study was in agreement with previous work showing that sco res on the EAT represent a primary difference between EAs and AAs; the present study was somewhat different than previous work in that serum lipoproteins were not significantly related to menstrual status.