A Multicenter Investigation on Nutritional Risk and Nutrition Therapy in Chinese Teaching Hospitals with Nutritional Risk Screening 2002

Abstract

Objective: Nutritional Risk Screening 2002 (NRS-2002) is recommended by ESPEN for nutri-tion screening. We aimed to compare the prevalence of nutritional risk and the rate of nutrition therapy based on NRS-2002 between surgical and internal medicine wards.
Methods: Patients admitting to four Chinese teaching hospitals were enrolled from April to December 2008. Patients were divided surgical wards (Departments of GI Surgery, hepatic surgery, Breast & thyroid surgery and Thoracic Surgery) and internal medicine wards (Depart-ments of Gastroenterology, Pulmonology, Neurology and Nephrology). The Nutritional Risk Screening (NRS) 2002 tool was used for nutritional risk screening. Prevalence of malnutrition, nutritional risk and implementation rate of nutritional therapy were compared between patients in surgical wards and those in internal medicine wards.
Results: A total of 1278 patients were in the final analysis. Among them, 551 patients were in surgical wards (the surgical group) and 727 patients were in internal medicine wards (the inter-nal group). Compared to the internal group, the prevalence of nutritional risk was significantly lower in the surgical group (27.22% vs. 39.48%, p=0.0001). There were no significantly differ-ences in prevalence of malnutrition between surgical and internal groups (15.06% vs. 16.23%, p=0.5702). In the internal group, more patients without nutritional risk underwent nutrition therapy (22.27% vs. 13.97%, p=0.0019) and fewer patients with malnutrition or nutritional risks underwent nutritional therapy (p<0.05).
Conclusions: Nutritional risk and inappropriate nutritional therapy are more common among patients in internal medicine wards than those in surgical wards. The NRS-2002 is a worthwhile nutritional risk screening tool for hospitalized patients.