Incorrect nutrition value
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It would be a pity to try alternatives to MFP because everything else they provide is exactly what I'm looking for. I understand the problem with policing the database, but how many other organisations would allow their credibility to be determined by users who can input into it whatever they like?
Maybe MFP should start by simplifying the information they provide. I don't know what obligatory information is required in the US, but in the UK it's the quantity of salt that has to appear on the packaging not sodium. If MFP changed sodium in mg to salt in g this would avoid the biggest source of errors (the mis-calculation of sodium) that I've found.
The whole point of MFP is that it is crowd sourced and highly personalizable. It can be used by anyone, no matter what their goals, what diet they like to eat, what country they are in, what health conditions they have, and how careful they want to be. The app/site is just a framework, a tool, all the responsibility is on the user to do the work to make it fit for them. The more they limit it, contain it, or try to make it more specific, the more people will find it doesn't work for them.
It can be labor intensive for the first month of using the app - you need to find good entries, create good entries for common foods in your particular diet that you can't find, personalize your goals and what info you want to track. But once you do the work, and stay consistent, it gets easier and easier. I've been logging for @ 4 years (2 years losing weight, 2 years maintaining) and now it barely takes me a couple of minutes a day to log. I spend more time brushing my teeth.
I agree with you that the report feature is misleading, but I think they should just get rid of it. Employing enough staff to curate the database would make it impossible for them to offer the free version of the app, which is what I've been using.8 -
It would be a pity to try alternatives to MFP because everything else they provide is exactly what I'm looking for. I understand the problem with policing the database, but how many other organisations would allow their credibility to be determined by users who can input into it whatever they like?
That users can add their own foods and the resulting huge database is why MFP is popular. If you couldn't add your own foods (which you can at Cron too), what would you do, ask MFP to add it when they got around to it? What about recipes (I would agree that recipes should not be made public).
The trick is learning to find the good entries.Maybe MFP should start by simplifying the information they provide. I don't know what obligatory information is required in the US, but in the UK it's the quantity of salt that has to appear on the packaging not sodium. If MFP changed sodium in mg to salt in g this would avoid the biggest source of errors (the mis-calculation of sodium) that I've found.
MFP does not provide the information, the people who enter it do.
In the US, sodium (in mg) is on the labels, so that is likely why MFP has that. So your change would mess it up for people in the US and other places that use sodium. (It's extremely easy to convert salt to sodium, I expect many people just don't care about either, or don't notice the difference because they don't care. It should not be difficult to create entries that work for you or find correct ones.)
Personally, the biggest source of errors on packaged-based entries I see are because package information changes and package information may be different from one country to another. So the entry you are saying is wrong and trying to get MFP to change may, in fact, be correct in Canada or the US, etc. But I don't log much packaged stuff anyway, so finding the whole foods entries was the trick that helped me. The options with smaller databases like Cron are much better for easy logging of whole foods, but would likely be a lot more work if you log lots of packaged stuff. You'd have to create your own, which you can already do here.4 -
As I said earlier, what's the point in the reports being reviewed, and members taking time to submit corrections, if nothing is done with them? Maybe as kimny72 suggests, why have this feature at all, but as it's there it ought to work.
In answer to carwyn, I don't plan on doing anything in addition to what I've done. I can't make it work. Hopefully now the matter has been well-aired, members will be more conscientious when inputting nutritional values; but I suspect what lemurcat2 has suggested is true, some don't care enough to be bothered.
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I think you are again ignoring the fact that an entry might be perfectly correct for the package one buys in the US, but be different from a package bought in Canada or the UK, so getting rid of the entry or changing it would be wrong. Similarly, there are often very similar versions of the same product, and something that seems like a wrong entry could just be for that other version.
The best solution is to make the corrections you think are needed and save it to your foods. Or, keep searching until you find the right version, which is often possible.5 -
Yes, I'll be using the "My Foods" from now on. But the bottom line is I don't really want to have to check every new food item that I scan.
Neither do I think that the problem is caused by variations between countries. I'm not bothered about minor errors, but outside the UK can you really buy, for example, a pack of 10 unsmoked back bacon rashers from Tesco that has zero salt! The problem really is members not entering data accurately.0 -
Who’s ‘carwyn’?
Also, how many members of MFP do you think are reading your post?3 -
As you probably know, I was referring to you. Apologies for getting your name wrong. When I sent in my first comment on 20th October I would have been quite happy to have just put my thoughts out there. The fact that it generated quite lengthy replies was pleasantly surprising.0
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To be accurate, you really do have to check anything new you scan, that's just how it is.3
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That's well understood. Thanks lemurcat2, and all other contributors to this discussion.1
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Ok, so I'm now using My Foods and the list is getting longer each day because sodium values have been incorrectly entered. But what a faff it then is if I want to enter a food item from it and I can't remember how the text starts, or whether I have actually entered it before. Wouldn't it be good if, when the barcode is scanned, I was given the option of using My Foods if I'd saved it previously.0
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Ok, so I'm now using My Foods and the list is getting longer each day because sodium values have been incorrectly entered. But what a faff it then is if I want to enter a food item from it and I can't remember how the text starts, or whether I have actually entered it before. Wouldn't it be good if, when the barcode is scanned, I was given the option of using My Foods if I'd saved it previously.
You have to remember how it starts. The search will look for the letter combination anywhere in the name, so if you search for "cinn" it will find "cinnamon bread" and "apple cinnamon" (if you have those 2 things in your my foods list). If you haven't entered anything with "cinn" in it, it will tell you that, too.3 -
Ok, many thanks Kathryn. I will persevere👍0
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I've just gotten use to checking against labels or USDA or other sources on the internet. Pain in the butt, but I'm using it for free, so can't complain too much2
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It will be difficult to police the database, so why don't MFP make it less open to errors. The requirement to show salt is a European-wide directive, which accounts for a pretty big population. If the reason sodium is used by MFP is because most of the world refers to that and not to salt, then maybe MFP ought to say how to convert salt to sodium. The bottom line remains, and is my original comment, that members who submit nutrition values should be more thorough so that others can rely on the data without having to check new food items each time they are entered. In addition, if MFP say they will review 'Submit A Correction' reports, then that's what they should do. They said it.
I agree with you in theory, but in reality this doesn't happen. I've made my peace with it.
I eat mostly whole foods and use entries from the USDA database, so the few times I have to double check user-entered entries doesn't really bother me.4 -
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@wainsweb1
Not everyone is interested in tracking salt/sodium or fill in the blank so a lot of the entries are incomplete/wrong...that’s life on a free app. I personally am glad to be able to create my own entries. Lets say I am making chilli, I can enter the entire recipe as one serving then divide it up from there and I don’t have to worry about mfp or other users changing it.
I do want to thank you. When you wrote you sent a report and when the error wasn’t corrected you reported the report malfunction I had quite a laugh.
Hope the new app works out1 -
Thank you all for your comments. All very much understood. From the UK to the US: hope you all have a great weekend1
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I eat mostly whole foods and have learnt to just go with my instinct and if unsure just go on the safe side. I've found even with verified items there to be inaccuracy, for example I just went and searched for potato to demonstrate. The top verified entry 'Potato' gave me 56cal for 100g, next one down verified was 'Potato (medium)' I changed the drop down to 100g and it gave me 110cal for 1x100g.The third ones verified 'potatoes' 1 cup I changed the drop down to be in grams and for 100g it gave me 80cal. None of these say whether it's raw or cooked value so likely could explain some incaracies.
If I find a discrepancy with packaged food I adjust portion size til it's close to matching. At the end of the day it serves its job, its close enough to be an effective tool if you're smart but it is painful to have to check everything rather than just pick the top results and be sure it's fine.2 -
I eat mostly whole foods and have learnt to just go with my instinct and if unsure just go on the safe side. I've found even with verified items there to be inaccuracy, for example I just went and searched for potato to demonstrate. The top verified entry 'Potato' gave me 56cal for 100g, next one down verified was 'Potato (medium)' I changed the drop down to 100g and it gave me 110cal for 1x100g.The third ones verified 'potatoes' 1 cup I changed the drop down to be in grams and for 100g it gave me 80cal. None of these say whether it's raw or cooked value so likely could explain some incaracies.
If I find a discrepancy with packaged food I adjust portion size til it's close to matching. At the end of the day it serves its job, its close enough to be an effective tool if you're smart but it is painful to have to check everything rather than just pick the top results and be sure it's fine.
The trick with whole foods is to learn to find the USDA entries that we input by MFP years ago.
One tipoff is that they will have raw or cooked (and cooking method). They also will have lots of measurement options.
If looking for potatoes, I'd search for "potatoes, raw."1
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