Prevalence of nutritional risks and malnutrition and application of nutritional support in elderly inpatients in Beijing

Abstract

Objective To investigate the prevalence of nutritional risks and malnutrition as well as the application of nutritional support in the department of geriatrics.Methods Elderly inpatients in the Geriatric Department of Peking University People's Hospital were consecutively enrolled from July 2010 to June 2011.Nutritional Risk Screening 2002 ( NRS 2002) was performed on the second day after admission,and nutritional support was investigated on the 14th day or the discharge day.The relationship between nutritional risk and nutritional support was analyzed.Results A total of 445 patients were enrolled,and 423 patients (95.1％ ) underwent NRS 2002.The overall prevalence of undernutrition was 4.7％ and nutritional risk was 13.2％.In 230 patients with overweight/obesity,the prevalence of nutritional risk was 6.1％.Nutritional support was provided to 15 patients (26.8％ ) with NRS2002≥3 and 14 patients (3.8％) with NRS 2002 ＜3.The average parenteral nutrition:enteral nutrition ratio was 1.6∶1.Conclusions A large proportion of elderly inpatients are at nutritional risk or suffer from undernutrition in the geriatric department in Beijing.The application of nutritional support currently is somehow inappropriate.Evidence-based guidelines are required to improve this situation.NRS2002 is not applicable for elderly inpatients with overweight/obesity. Key words: Nutritional risk; Malnutrition; Elderly; Nutritional Risk Screening 2002; Nutritional support