NEW PATTERNS OF DRINKING-WATER CONSUMPTION - RESULTS OF A PILOT-STUDY

A pilot study on water consumption was carried out in the Quebec City region in April and May 1996 with 125 people using a 24-h recall plus a 2-day diary. Consumption of drinking water via liquid and food was a ssessed as well as the type of water consumed (tap, bottle or filtered water) and place of consumption (home or away from home). Most of the people (56%) were drinking some bottled water or filtered tap water a nd 25% of water intake was away from home. Food consumption was found to be a non-significant source of drinking-water intake. The average w ater consumption was nearly similar in exclusively tap-water consumers and bottled-or filtered-water consumers (1.5 vs. 1.71/day, P = 0.29) but two-thirds of the consumption in this last group is natural water, while it is mixed water in the bottled/filtered-water group. No signi ficant difference in amounts consumed were found according to age, but older people drank hot beverages and soup more often. The present pil ot-study was weakened by a low participation rate (14%). Incentive mig ht be necessary to improve participation rate and data collection meth ods must also be simplified. A 24-h recall plus a 1-day diary seem suf ficient and data on consumption could be limited to liquids, soups and cereals. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.