Abstract
Objective: To investigate patient-reported factors those promote or inhibit food intake in older people after discharge from hospital. Background: Disease-related malnutrition leads to poor appetite, decreased food intake and affects convalescence negatively. Design: Secondary analysis of two intervention groups from an RCT. Methods: 111 older adults received nutritional follow-up one, two and four weeks after discharge. Self-reported food intake was classified as adequate (AQ) or inadequate (IAQ) energy intake two weeks after discharge. Data on inhibitory and promoting factors, body weight, ADL-function, readmission and mortality were analysed and comparison made between AQ and IAQ groups. Results: More IAQ participants reported fatigue and eating all meals alone. All participants lost body weight, but more IAQ participants lost body weight. More IAQ participants were readmitted to hospital 30 days after discharge. Conclusion: “Fatigue” and “eating all meals alone” affect food intake negatively, leading to loss of body weight and readmission to hospital.
Highlights
Disease-related malnutrition leads to poor appetite and decreased food intake, which affects older people’s convalescence negatively, after acute disease and hospital discharge
The present study shows a trend towards maintained ADL function at two months after discharge in participants with adequate energy intake
The presence of the patient-reported factors “fatigue” and “eating all meals alone” after discharge affected food intake negatively during the following weeks. This led to failure to meet individual energy needs followed by loss of body weight and readmission to hospital 30 days after discharge
Summary
Disease-related malnutrition leads to poor appetite and decreased food intake, which affects older people’s convalescence negatively, after acute disease and hospital discharge. Acute and chronic disease further aggravates nutritional status with increased metabolic activity and further decreased appetite and food intake [9]. Unlike their younger counterparts, older individuals do not spontaneously regain their appetite or resume previous food intake after recovery [10]. In order to understand the obstacles that older individuals face after disease and discharge from hospital, we wanted to identify inhibiting and promoting factors to food intake from the patient’s perspective and investigate their consequences
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