Abstract
Nutritional support is a cornerstone of clinical care and should be provided to all persons, including persons with pressure ulcers, consistent with medical goals and patient wishes. Whether nutrition can improve the outcome of pressure ulcers remains disputable. Energy requirements for persons with pressure ulcers are estimated empirically between 25 and 30 kcal/kg/day, but have been confirmed in studies using nutritional formulas such as the Harris–Benedict equation. The optimum amount of protein intake is not known, but likely lies between 1.2 and 1.5 g/kg/day. Higher protein intakes may be harmful and have not been associated with higher rates of healing. Supplemental amino acids and supertherapeutic supplements of vitamins and minerals have not been shown to have much effect on the healing of pressure ulcers. Clinical nutritional intervention trials suffer from small sample sizes and poor methodological design, but in general have not shown exceptional benefit in improving complete healing of pressure ulcers. Nutritional therapy will improve starvation due to lack of food, but cachexia associated with inflammatory conditions has been remarkably resistant to hypercaloric feeding.
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