Jana Moss had a scare last week when McDonald’s announced new tests show more fat and trans fat in its French fries than previously believed, raising questions about the accuracy of nutrition information provided by restaurants and food services.

Moss, a senior in public relations, has been a vegetarian since the first grade and often substitutes fries for meat when she’s eating out with friends.

“When I saw that article about McDonald’s, it kind of scared me because trans fat can be correlated with cancer,” Moss said. “We just learned about trans fat in my health class, and [the professor] just said it’s really bad for you.”

Recent U. S. Food and Drug Administration regulations have focused on links between trans fats and heart disease and require trans fat content be listed on packaged foods. The new rules have drawn attention to the sources of nutrition information for both packaged foods and restaurants.

University Dining offers a nutritional analysis for many menu items offered in campus cafeterias. This information, assembled by campus nutritionist Lisa Eberhart, is available on the University Web site at ncsudining.com.

For prepared foods, Eberhart calls the manufacturer for nutrition data; for items prepared by University Dining, she uses a computer program called Food Processor to estimate the nutrition based on the recipe.

“I have [an] untrustworthy feeling about some of the analyses,” she said. “Who knows if they’re correct? Anybody who has cooked knows that things change slightly, but it’s a good guess. I would go with those numbers as a guideline.”

Taco Bell, which provides nutrition information online and at its on-campus restaurant, uses a similar recipe-based calculation to estimate nutrition information for its menu items.

McDonald’s methods, on the other hand, are proprietary. A customer service agent was unable to disclose the name of the company that does the testing, nor what changes in methodology led to the identification of higher fat content.

Leon Boyd, a professor of food science, was not surprised by the McDonald’s news.

“In many cases, the information will change when a restaurant gets things from different suppliers,” Boyd said. “The testing methods are constantly updated, and during previous analyses, trans fats may not have been completely defined. Some of them could have been lumped into a different category of fat.”

When a food is tested, it is first subjected to a “proximate composition analysis,” Boyd said. This involves testing the amount of moisture, fat and protein in the food and then calculating the amount of carbohydrates by subtracting the other three categories from the total weight of the food.

However, nutrition labels usually provide more detailed information that is established using chromatography — a laboratory technique that separates a chemical mixture into its individual components. For example, the total fats extracted from a food sample can be separated, then identified as saturated, unsaturated or trans fats based on comparison to standards.

The same general procedure is used whether an individual ingredient or a finished product is being tested. However, since accepted databases of ingredient information are established, it is more common to calculate the nutrition of a finished food rather than test the final product directly.

University students and staff have expressed a casual attitude toward fluctuations in the nutrition information provided to them.

In spite of Moss’ initial concern about the trans fat news, she doesn’t plan to change her eating habits.

“I eat other healthier stuff to make up for the fries,” she said. “I think they need to change how they’re cooking the fries, but I still eat a lot of them.”

Chad Gore, a post-doctoral research associate in entomology, often heads to Fountain Dining Hall for lunch, and isn’t worried about possible inaccuracies in the nutrition information.

“At the cafeteria or in a restaurant, I don’t pay attention to the nutrition information,” he said. “Twenty-five grams, 30 grams … What’s the difference? It’s intuitive what’s good for you and what’s not. When it comes to grocery store shopping, though, I always turn over the box, look at the label, and if it has any trans fat at all, I put it back.”