Development, validation and implementation of a program to detect malnutrition with NRS-2002 screening tool in patients of the oncology and hematology service

Abstract

Background: Hospital malnutrition is an increasingly prevalent situation, which involves both an increase in health costs, a decrease in the life quality of those who suffer from it, and greater morbimortality. Nutritional screening is essential to detect malnutrition early and avoid these complications.Methods: NRS-2002 was performed on all patients admitted to the oncohaematology service, followed by the complete nutritional assessment (VN) to check its validity, which is repeated weekly to determine the degree of malnutrition during the hospital stay. Data were summarized using mean (standard deviation) and median (1st, 3rd quartile) for numerical variables, and absolute frequency (relative) for qualitative variables. To measure agreement between the two diagnoses, Cohen's Kappa was calculated for each visit. The level of association between the variables was measured using the Goodman and Kruskal measure.Results: 573 patients were admitted to the oncohaematology service, of which: 34.4% malnutrition, 44.7% risk of malnutrition and 20.9% good nutritional condition, on admission to hospital according to the NRS-2002. In patients admitted for more than a week, NRS-2002 was performed weekly and found that, upon discharge, they suffered: 34.4% malnutrition, 50.8% risk of malnutrition and 14.76% good nutritional status; also 12.3% worsen their nutritional status, 68.9% maintain it and only 18.9% improve it. 78.8% of patients with longer admissions require a VN. Conclusions:Our results suggest that the NRS-2002 is a simple and effective method for early malnutrition detection. It's important a nutritional monitoring during the hospitalization period, because the patients are susceptible to worsening of their nutritional status.