Diet quality in U.S. adults eating in senior and community centers: NHANES 2009-2018

•Eating at community centers was associated with an improved nutrient exposure in older men.•Eating at community centers was not associated with an improved nutrient exposure in older women.•Diet quality in older US adults remains poor when compared to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. With advancing age, the worsening of cognitive and physical disabilities may lead older adults to seek help in their daily living activities. Community/senior centers support older adults during aging, offering a wide variety of services, including meal programs. Using data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (2009–2018), we aimed to examine whether community/senior center meal programs were associated with an improved nutritional exposure in U.S. adults aged 60 years or older. Nutrient exposure and nutrient-based dietary indexes, including the Diet Quality Score (DQS) and the Food Nutrient Index (FNI) were compared between those eating meals at community/senior centers and the general population. Nutrient intakes were contrasted to the daily nutritional goals from the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. This study included 6261 participants aged ≥60 years, thereof n = 421 reporting community/senior center meals. The latter were predominantly female and almost 45% were widowed or divorced. Eating at community/senior centers did not result in a better diet quality in crude analyses. After adjustment for potential sociodemographic confounders as well as alcohol, smoking and energy intake, however, sex-specific differences emerged, revealing significantly higher FNI scores in males eating at community/senior centers (adjusted FNI predictions: 61.71 [CI:58.55–64.88] vs 57.64 [CI:56.86−58.41] points). Eating at community/senior centers was associated with an improved nutrient exposure in older men, whereas no better diet quality was found in women. Community/senior centers may play a pivotal role when it comes to the diet quality of a particularly vulnerable group of the population.