Objective To investigate the dietary preference and nutritional knowledge needs of the elderly people who dined at meal service sites.

Methods Using the form of stratified and convenience sampling method with self-designed questionnaire was used， in November 2021， to select 700 elderly people who dine at meal service sites in 7 jurisdictions in Shanghai were selected， and a self-designed questionnaire was used to investigate the basic information.

Results 91.64% of the elderly surveyed would eat at relatively fixed meal service sites， and the total Dietary Diversity Score （DDS9） was 3.56±1.46. 41.45% of the elderly with diseases preferred unhealthy cooking methods. Only 8.03% of the surveyed seniors said they were unwilling to accept targeted and personalized nutrition tips and reminders. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the probability reaching the “understanding” level of “Food Guide Pagoda for Chinese Residents” and “Four Principles Recommended by the Core Dietary Guidelines for the Elderly” was different in the elderly with different education levels. The willingness of the elderly to expect to receive different nutrition tips and reminders was related to whether they cared about the corresponding contents. There was a statistically significant difference （P<0.05） among the elderly who were concerned about different health problems in terms of the willingness to receive different nutritional tips. There were significant differences in the proportion of elderly people with different health status for intervention （χ²=5.402， P<0.05）.

Conclusion The elderly who dine at meal service sites are highly dependent on the sites， have a low level of dietary diversification， and do not have a high degree of understanding of nutrition-related knowledge， and have a high demand for targeted nutritional interventions. Nutritional interventions for the sick elderly should be piloted through multiple channels.