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Screening for nutritional risk in community-dwelling old-old
Bonnie L Callen1, Thelma J Wells
1University of Tennessee College of Nursing, Knoxville 37996, USA. bcallen@utk.edu
Public Health Nursing (Boston, Mass.)
|April 30, 2005
Summary
Detecting declining nutrition in older adults is challenging. Depression and adequate food intake predict unintentional weight loss in community-dwelling elders aged 80 and above.
Area of Science:
- Gerontology
- Nutritional Science
- Public Health
Background:
- Screening tools for nutritional decline in community-dwelling older adults (old-old) are limited and often problematic.
- Identifying reliable risk factors is crucial for early intervention in this growing demographic.
Purpose of the Study:
- To identify key risk factors for poor nutritional status in independent community-dwelling elders aged 80 years and older.
- To examine the relationship between nutritional risk factors and measures of nutritional status.
Main Methods:
- Cross-sectional descriptive study of 68 community-dwelling elders (average age 85.7).
- Data collected via in-home interviews by parish nurses.
- Analysis of five nutritional risk factors and two nutritional status measures (BMI categories, unintentional weight loss).
Main Results:
- Depression and adequate consumption of food pyramid groups predicted unintentional weight loss in the past 6 months (p = 0.013).
- These factors did not predict high or low body mass index (BMI).
- Obesity was present in 25% of the sample.
Conclusions:
- Screening for depression and assessing food intake may help predict nutritional decline in community-dwelling old-old.
- These findings can guide targeted interventions for this population, who are significant users of healthcare resources.