Impact of failure to thrive on inpatient mortality and resource utilization in patients with head and neck cancer: A nationwide analysis.

Abstract

e18531 Background: Failure to thrive (FTT), encompassing malnutrition and cachexia, is a common comorbidity afflicting Head and Neck cancer (HNC), brought about either by progression of disease or complications of treatment. FTT can exacerbate infections or cytopenias and delay wound healing, and has shown to affect survival in HNC. This study aims to explore the effects of FTT on mortality and resource utilization among hospitalized patients with HNC. Methods: Adult patients with HNC admitted from 2012-2017 were identified from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample database. Temporal trends of resource utilization across six years were evaluated. Multivariable logistic regression was used to evaluate risk factors for malnutrition and mortality in patients with HNC. Results: A total of 448,255 patients met inclusion criteria, of which 27.2% had FTT. Mean age was 66.3 years. Patients were predominantly male (71.8%) and white (70.4%). Patients with FTT had higher mortality (6.3% vs. 3.6%, p<0.0001), longer hospital stay (9.1 vs. 5.7 days, p<0.0001) and higher hospital charges ($23k vs. $18k, p<0.0001). On multivariate analysis, risk factors for FTT included male sex, African American (AA) race and higher comorbidity burden. After adjusting for confounders, patients with FTT had higher inpatient mortality (OR 1.71, 95% CI 1.60-1.83, p<0.001). There is an increasing trend of FTT in HNC over the years, from 22.7% to 32.6% (p trend <0.001). Temporal trends in mortality, length of stay and hospital charges in those with FTT did not change significantly. Conclusions: Patients with HNC and FTT had higher inpatient mortality than those without FTT. AA patients especially were at higher risk of FTT. Inpatients with HNC and FTT had longer mean hospital stay by 3 days incurring higher healthcare costs. The study highlights an under acknowledged paradigm in HNC care and warrants further steps towards more vigilant nutritional surveillance and interventions, such as early/prophylactic enteral feeding in HNC patients. This could greatly improve quality of life and objective outcomes in HNC patients. [Table: see text]