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For a professional

What is the Finnish Nutrition Navigator?​

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator (Ravitsemusnavigaattori) is a free, research-based online tool for assessing the quality of an adult’s diet. The assessment is based on the Healthy Diet Index (HDI), the reliability of which has been scientifically evaluated. The tool gives general feedback on the diet's strong points and areas of improvement compared with the nutritional recommendations.

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator can be used independently or together with a professional. It takes about 10–15 minutes to fill in the navigator independently. You can use it to assess, monitor and record the quality of a diet.

Quick guide​

This is how you use the Finnish Nutrition Navigator as a professional.

1. Before an appointment / during an appointment​

  • Ask your client to fill in the Finnish Nutrition Navigator at https://ravitsemusnavigaattori.fi
  • Set aside about 10–15 minutes for filling in the navigator
  • Remind your client to save their personal code for the feedback and share it with you so you can also see the results. The client decides for themselves if they want to share their code with a professional.

2. During an appointment​

  • Enter the code in “Retrieve your feedback”.
  • Check your results together.
  • Record the score (0–100 points) on the quality of your client’s diet and its categories if necessary, for example in the patient information system.

3. Give guidance and follow-up​

  • Find out your client’s own observations about their diet. Give positive feedback.
  • Find out in a customer-oriented way what changes they want and what kind of changes they are willing to make.
  • Set 1–3 small goals of change.
  • Plan and write down concrete actions for these goals.
  • Guide your client to https://ravitsemuspolku.fi website for more support.
  • In a follow-up meeting, ask your client to fill in the Finnish Nutrition Navigator again, for example after 3–6 months. Record the results.
tip

In order to save the code for the results from the Finnish Nutrition Navigator, take a photo or a screenshot of the code on a smartphone. The feedback can also be saved as a PDF and printed.

Who is it suitable for?​

  • For adults aged around 18–74 who want to check their eating habits on a general level
  • for Finnish food culture
  • for a person who may have obesity or risk factors for chronic lifestyle diseases, such as elevated blood pressure or high cholesterol levels
  • for a person who may have previously been diagnosed with a chronic disease, such as cardiovascular disease or type 2 diabetes.

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator might not be suitable in the following cases:

  • the person has food allergies, special diets or medical conditions that significantly affect their food consumption and nutrition absorption
  • the person is under 18 or over 74 years old, pregnant or breastfeeding
  • the person currently suffers from or has earlier suffered from an eating disorder
  • the person has poor IT or cognitive skills.

What can I use it for?​

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator may help you find out about your client’s usual eating habits in an easy and quick way. The tool is especially useful in such nutritional counselling situations where you want to review the current quality of your client’s diet, support capability to dietary changes, set concrete goals of change and offer a tool for self-monitoring.

The tool can be utilised especially for the following purposes:

  • As a self-care tool to support dietary changes
  • As a tool for nutritional and lifestyle coaching
  • To assess and monitor the quality of your client’s diet
  • To recognise the strong points and areas of improvement in your client’s diet
  • As a tool for evaluating the effectiveness of guidance.
  • To support structural recording and researching of a diet
  • For general assessment of a diet according to the nutritional therapy recommendations (2023) and nutritional recommendations (2024).
tip

A link to the Finnish Nutrition Navigator and its user guide can be integrated as part of an organisation’s service path. Contact us if necessary.

No replacement for a professional​

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator is not a medical tool and it is not meant for prevention, treatment or diagnosing of medical conditions. The Finnish Nutrition Navigator is based on the general national nutritional recommendations for adults and it does not take possible individual factors, such as special diets, medical conditions or energy requirements into account.

It also does not replace the guidance, assessments or instructions given by a healthcare professional. A professional should always take their client’s background and individual nutritional needs into account and carry out the guidance and treatment they require. We also do not guarantee that our service’s information is error-free.

What does the Finnish Nutrition Navigator contain?​

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator consists of three parts:

  • Food consumption questionnaire: 48 questions that evaluate the usual consumption of food groups that are crucial for the nutritional recommendations (takes about 10–15 min).
  • The Healthy Diet Index: a scientifically validated measure that evaluates the overall quality and categories of a diet on a scale 0–100 and how well the food choices match the Finnish nutritional recommendations on a general level.
  • Feedback: a clear, visual and written summary of a diet’s strong points and areas of improvement to support understanding one’s own situation.

Additionally, the service guides the user to the Ravitsemuspolku.fi service, which offers more support and practical tips.

Further information about the food consumption questionnaire​

Further information about the food consumption questionnaire

The 48 question food consumption questionnaire in the Finnish Nutrition Navigator is based on a D2D food consumption questionnaire, which is used to evaluate a person’s usual eating habits (Hemiö et al. 2014). It measures consumption of food groups that play a key role for health:

  • Daily meals
  • Main dishes and fast food
  • Fruits, berries and vegetables
  • Legumes
  • Grain products and side dishes
  • Potatoes
  • Cooking fats, salad dressings and fat spreads
  • Nuts and seeds
  • Dairy products and plant-based alternatives
  • Meat products
  • Sweet snacks
  • Coffee, tea and water
  • Sugary beverages
  • Alcoholic beverages

The food consumption questionnaire has been updated, for example in regards to given food examples and selections, and it has also been made more user-friendly with the help of user testing.

Further information about the Healthy Diet Index​

Further information about the Healthy Diet Index

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator evaluates the general quality of a diet in relation to the nutritional recommendations using the Healthy Diet Index. The Healthy Diet Index’s total score varies between 0–100 points and the higher the score, the better the food choices correspond to the Finnish nutritional recommendations. The nutritional recommendations act as a base for a diet that promotes health, supports weight management, prevents chronic diseases and is environmentally sustainable.

The Healthy Diet Index also separately evaluates the seven different categories of a diet. The categories are scored and weighted according to the overall diet as follows:

Scoring of the Healthy Diet Index’s categories:

  • Meal rhythm 10 / 100 points
  • Fruits and vegetable 20 / 100 points
  • Grain products 20 / 100 points
  • Quality of fat 15 / 100 points
  • Vegetable, fish and meat dishes 10 / 100 points
  • Dairy products 10 / 100 points
  • Snacks and high-energy drinks 15 / 100 points.

The reliability of the Healthy Diet Index has been scientifically peer-reviewed (Lindström et al. 2021). Several nutritionists and organisations, such as Dehko 2D project’s consortium, Tampere University Hospital, Pirkanmaa Hospital District, The Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), University of Eastern Finland and the Stop Diabetes project, participated in its development.

THL is responsible for the administration and scientific development of the Healthy Diet Index, and Jaana Lindström serves as the contact person.

Further information about the feedback​

Further information about the feedback

Feedback from the Finnish Nutrition Navigator is written by nutritionists and it is based on the national nutritional recommendations. Its goal is to illustrate the strong points of a diet and offer support for recognising areas that need to be changed.

The feedback includes:

  • The Healthy Diet Index’s total score and seven colour-coded categories
  • A short written feedback and recommended choices
  • The user’s own responses to the food consumption questionnaire.

Interpreting the results:

  • Green = the diet nearly matches the recommendations, red = more needs for change.
  • The written feedback helps interpreting the colours and guides towards practical solutions.
  • The professional’s role is to highlight the positive things and help the client find small changes that fit their everyday life. There is no need to aim for the perfect score.

Benefits for a professional:

  • The possibility to record the Healthy Diet Index’s total score in the patient information system for a follow-up period.
  • The results can be utilised together with the tips from the Ravitsemuspolku.fi service and the service’s Path of Change (Muutospolku) section.
  • If necessary, the results can also be specified to the level of individual questions.

The Finnish Nutrition Path (Ravitsemuspolku) as support for a professional​

Ravitsemuspolku.fi offers practical, research-based material to support dietary changes. The website contains diet-themed tips, exercises and tools that help your client recognise their own strengths and make small, concrete changes in their everyday life.

Useful for a professional:

  • You can guide your client to the contents of the Finnish Nutrition Path to support the goals that you agreed upon during the guidance.
  • The exercises and tips are suitable for both individual and group guidance.
  • In the Path of Change (Muutospolku) section you can find a form where your client can write down their own goals and follow their progress.

The Finnish Nutrition Path complements the feedback from the Finnish Nutrition Navigator by offering practical tools to make and maintain changes.

The research behind it​

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator is based on long-term research. The Healthy Diet Index behind it has been developed and validated in national research projects, coordinated by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare and several expert groups. The development work of the Finnish Nutrition Navigator and Nutrition Path is described in a scientific publication (Järvelä-Reijonen et al. 2025).

What does the research reveal?​

The research results show that higher Healthy Diet Index scores are connected to positive health factors, such as a lower body mass index and smaller waistline, and lower glucose and lipid levels (Lindström et al. 2021).

Every 10 point improvement in the Healthy Diet Index is associated with positive changes in glucose and lipid metabolism, even without changes in body weight (Lindström et al. 2021). Additionally, higher scores are associated with higher physical activity and better eating competence, in other words better attitude towards food and eating (Aittola et al. 2023).

Practical impacts​

In practical guidance, such as Stop Diabetes lifestyle intervention, where group lifestyle guidance and use of digital application were offered to the participants, the Healthy Diet Index improved approximately by 5% during one year while also waistline got smaller (Lakka et al. 2021).

Development and research continue​

The Finnish Nutrition Navigator is currently being piloted in Kuopio in exercise counselling and occupational health care as part of North Savo’s regional FOODNUTRI project (2024–2026). Furthermore, the tool’s utility and impact are being researched, and the tool is being implemented in the Joint Action on Cardiovascular Diseases and Diabetes (JACARDI) project, which is co-funded by the EU in collaboration with the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare and Finnish Diabetes Association.

References​

  • Ravitsemuspolku. https://ravitsemuspolku.fi
  • Järvelä-Reijonen E, Aittola K, Honkanen J ym. The development of public online services for assessing diet quality, having automated feedback, and getting support for dietary changes: the Finnish Nutrition Navigator and the Finnish Nutrition Path (Ravitsemusnavigaattori and Ravitsemuspolku). Finnish Journal of EHealth and EWelfare 2025;17(1):84–100. https://doi.org/10.23996/fjhw.153303
  • Aittola K, Karhunen L, Tilles-Tirkkonen T ym. Higher Healthy Diet Index associates with better eating competence and lower adiposity in two adult cohorts in Finland. Abstract in the International Society of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity (ISBNPA) conference, 2023, Uppsala, Sweden.
  • Hemiö K, Pölönen A, Ahonen K ym. A simple tool for diet evaluation in primary health care: validation of a 16-item food intake questionnaire. Int J Environ Res Public Health 20144;11(3):2683-97.
  • Lakka T, Aittola K, Järvelä-Reijonen E ym. Real-world effectiveness of digital and group-based lifestyle interventions as compared with usual care to reduce type 2 diabetes risk – A stop diabetes pragmatic randomised trial. Lancet Reg Health Eur 2023;24:100527.
  • Lindström J, Aittola K, Pölönen A ym. Formation and Validation of the Healthy Diet Index (HDI) for Evaluation of Diet Quality in Healthcare. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2021;18(5):2362.
  • Valtion ravitsemusneuvottelukunta (VRN) ja Terveyden ja hyvinvoinnin laitos (THL). Ravitsemushoitosuositus. Ohjaus 3/2023. Saatavilla: https://www.julkari.fi/handle/10024/146233
  • VRN Valtion ravitsemusneuvottelukunta. Terveyttä ruoasta. Suomalaiset ravitsemussuositukset 2014. Helsinki 2018.