Understanding Nutritional Health in Older Adults: A Pilot Study

Abstract

A pilot study of adults ages 65 and older admitted to an acute care setting was conducted to compare nutritional risk as measured by hospital dieticians with two Nutrition Screening Initiative tools, the DETERMINE Your Nutritional Health Checklist and the Level I Screen, and to elicit from patients their own perceptions of nutritional health. Ten community-living older adults were interviewed. Although all 10 were at nutritional risk as measured by both hospital assessment and nutritional risk screening tools, none of these patients believed themselves to be at risk. One conclusion of this pilot is that interventions and education need to be tailored to the perceptions of targeted individuals.

<p>Low Self-Perception of Malnutrition in Older Hospitalized Patients</p>

“…Findings of a small pilot study among ten hospitalized seniors (ages 65 and older) who were classified to be at risk of malnutrition by nutrition screening indicated that none of the patients believed to be at risk of malnutrition whereas they reported to have a good nutritional intake. 20 The same is true for our study since the majority of those who were classified as malnourished (67%) or at risk of malnutrition (92%) according to MNA-SF did not see themselves malnourished or at risk of malnutrition.…”

Effects of fish-derived lipoprotein extracts on activation markers, Fas expression and apoptosis in peripheral blood lymphocytes

“…One of the most common immune weakeners is malnutrition, the commonest cause of immunodeficiency worldwide [1], and nutritional deficiencies are seen in at least one-third of the elderly in industrialized countries [2][3][4][5]. Stress, a major assault on immune health [6] as well as overeating and obesity, now epidemic in the Western world, also decrease immune function [7,8].…”

Dementia and the Gap in Nutrition: A Review

“…Nutritional screening initiative in America according to Callen [67] (2004), is divided into two which include DETERMINE and level 1 screen. DETERMINE is a checklist used to check the nutritional status of patient so as to detect malnutrition.…”

“…DETERMINE is a checklist used to check the nutritional status of patient so as to detect malnutrition. The checklist includes: Disease, Eating poorly, Tooth loss and mouth pain, Economic hardship, Reduced social contact, Multiple medicine, Involuntary weight loss or gain, Need assistance in self-care, and Older than 80 years and level 1 screen is also used and it has 4 sections which include body mass index, eating habits, living environment and functional status [67].…”