Disease-related malnutrition in hospitalized chronic patients with complex needs

Disease-related malnutrition is a prevalent condition that can be associated with multimorbidity. The purposes of this study were to assess the prevalence of disease-related malnutrition in a cohort of chronic patients with complex needs (CPCN) admitted to two University hospitals, and to evaluate the impact of malnutrition in their hospitalization outcomes.

All CPCN admitted on a previously agreed day in non-critical services of two University hospitals in Catalonia were included. Nutritional risk was evaluated with Mini-Nutritional Assessment Tool and Nutritional Risk Screening 2002. Hospitalization outcome data were evaluated, including length of the hospital stay, mortality during admission and placement when discharged. After five months, a new evaluation was performed to assess mortality and readmissions.

A total of 101 patients were included, 83% of which were at nutritional risk when screened with NRS-2002; when using MNA, 86% of them were found to be either at nutritional risk or malnourished. Malnourished patients had a greater need for home care/intermediate care hospital at discharge (41.8% vs 22.9%, p < 0.01), and a higher mortality rate during admission (16.7% vs 1.6%, p < 0.01). Mortality at 5 months was also higher in the malnourished group (30.5% vs 9.8%, p < 0.01). Factors associated with malnutrition were BMI and gender (malnutrition was more prevalent in women). In our cohort, malnutrition was the sole independent predictor of mortality at 5 months.

The prevalence of both malnutrition and risk of malnutrition is very high in hospital-admitted CPCN, and has a profound impact on placement at discharge and mortality. This high prevalence is not explained by the multimorbidity pattern. Other factors need to be evaluated in this group of high-need, high-cost patients.