Efficacy of EPA‐enriched supplement compared with standard formula on body weight changes in malnourished patients with head and neck cancer undergone surgery: a randomized study

Abstract

Background: Eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) containing nutritional supplement can reverse weight loss and increase lean body mass in a perioperative period of patients with head and neck cancer. To study effects of an EPA-enriched supplement compared with a conventional supplement in malnourished patients with head and neck cancer following surgery is primary objective. Methods: The patients were randomized into EPA-enriched and standard formula group. The supplements were prescribed 7 days preoperative through 14 days postoperative. Body weight and composition including serum parameters were measured from 7 days preoperative until 4 months postoperative. The hospitalized courses were recorded. Results: Thirty-one patients in each group consumed EPA-enriched and standard formula supplements. There was no significant body weight or composition changes perioperative. No significant differences in the hospitalized days and postoperative complications was observed. Conclusions: Body weight changes in malnourished patients with head and neck cancer following surgery were not influenced by EPA additives to perioperative nutritional supplements. K E Y W O R D S EPA-enriched, head and neck cancer, malnourished, supplement, surgery

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Longitudinal Changes in the Fatty Acid Profile in Patients with Head and Neck Cancer: Associations with Treatment and Inflammatory Response

“…An unexpected finding was the increased risk of all-cause death within 3 years in case of higher levels of 20:5n-3 at 3 months after the treatment termination, but this was a secondary analysis and thus needs confirmation to exclude a chance finding. The role of 20:5n-3 in HNC is mostly studied regarding its role in body weight changes and inflammation markers, with inconsistent results suggesting the need for further studies [ 45 , 48 ].…”

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“…Orapipatpong, [37] included tumour stage 1-2 and no recurrent tumours, but the majority of patients recruited in this and by Van Bokhorst-De Van Der Schueren et al…”

“…Following review of the full manuscript four studies were excluded. Two studies were excluded as they did not include the primary outcome measure [33,34], one study included parenteral nutrition [35] and another study commenced the intervention at various points along the treatment journey and not solely during pre-treatment [36] Therefore, two papers [37,38] met the full criteria for systematic review (Figure 1).…”

“…Study characteristics are presented in Table 2. The studies had several comparable characteristics, both were randomised controlled trials that were conducted in malnourished surgical head and neck cancer patients as measured by weight loss of > 10% over the past 6 months [38] or with a score of ≥ 2 on the Malnutrition Screening Tool (MST) [37] and were nutrition only, single modal interventions. The main contrast was their year of publication which differed by 18 years and location of study.…”